The Aftereffects of a Miracle
by The Pea Pod in the Pumpkin Pie
Summary: Minerva McGonagall decides to visit Harry Potter a month before the Hogwarts acceptance letters go out, worried about how he's been getting on these past several years under the Dursleys. She finds a ragged boy locked in a cupboard. She helps him, of course, but she also decides he needs therapy. What kind of difference would a little assistance have made to Harry Potter's life?
1. Chapter 1

1.

It had been several days since the latest incident of something strange, this time the Brazilian boa constrictor setting on my cousin Dudley in the zoo. As always, I had been locked in the cupboard underneath the staircase as punishment for something I didn't know how I could have caused. But I was sitting in my cupboard one afternoon, and there was a knock on the front door.

I heard Aunt Petunia's heels clack to the entrance hall and she opened it. A woman's voice sounded from the other side, stern and brisk. "I am here to offer your nephew -"

"We're not buying," my aunt interrupted.

"I am not selling anything," said the woman. "It is an educational opportunity."

I perked up. My grades were fairly good, but they weren't fantastic. Who could possibly want to offer me some sort of special educational opportunity?

"Well, if you're looking for an excellent student, my son -" Aunt Petunia began brightly, and I snorted. Dudley was an idiot, and a spoiled one at that. Him deserving a special educational opportunity was even more unlikely than me deserving one.

"I am not interested in your son," the woman interrupted. "Only in your nephew."

Aunt Petunia began to get angry. "Well, my nephew is not interested!" she snapped, and I heard her move to slam the door shut - something stopped it. The woman, presumably.

"I would like to hear that from him," she said simply.

Aunt Petunia was caught off guard, I could tell from her voice. "Wh-what?" Here, she was in a dilemma. She couldn't reveal to outsiders that she regularly locked her nephew inside the cupboard under the stairs. And she definitely couldn't reveal it was because she thought he could control snakes and make glass zoo tanks vanish.

At last, she said snappishly, "Wait here." And she shut the door. I half expected her to just leave the woman standing there, but instead I heard the chain unlock and my cupboard door was jerked open. "Someone's here to talk to you," she said brusquely, glaring at me as though it were my fault. "And you'd better not say anything, and you'd better act polite."

"Yes, Aunt Petunia," I agreed, happy just to be let out and allowed to talk to another human being. I was also curious. What could this woman want?

I went to the door and opened it, looking up into the face of a tall woman with a bun of black hair, square glasses, and a stern face. She wore a black pantsuit and an emerald green dress shirt, and carried a briefcase. Her lips pursed when she saw me, as if she already disapproved.

"Mr Potter?" she said. "I am Professor Minerva McGonagall, and I am here on behalf of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

For a moment, I thought it was a joke.

Then my uncle bellowed like a wounded rhinoceros and skidded out into the entrance hall from where he'd been watching television in the living room. My aunt screeched and sprinted forward to pull me back. Dudley thundered down the stairs in surprise and confusion.

This all happened essentially at the same time.

Professor McGonagall reacted. She pulled out a long strip of wood - a wand? - and in a flash of violet light all three of my relatives were farm animals. I stopped and stared.

Professor McGonagall put her wand away rather briskly. "I was worried about you, so I thought I'd come a month before the letters were sent out," she said. "I asked Dumbledore to lift the sensors barring magic from being done in the house for a specified period of time. Well, technically, he didn't do it, the Minister for Magic did. Good thing, too. It looks like it was needed. I never did agree with leaving you with these people."

I tried to make sound. "Professor - what -?" I was completely lost. Very coherent, I'm sure.

"Ah, yes, I'm sure you have questions," she said briskly. "In that order: I am from a school of magic that exists inside a hidden world of magic. You have magic too. You're to be invited to join. Most times we can't do magic around Muggles, or non magical people, but our government made it so that I temporarily can."

"But… about leaving me with the Dursleys…?"

"Ah, yes. I was friends with your parents." My eyes widened. "Come now, Mr Potter, you didn't really think your parents had died in an ordinary way, did you? You're hardly ordinary yourself."

Well, I couldn't argue with that.

"I was told they died in a car crash," I managed.

Professor McGonagall looked at me sympathetically. "So you know nothing."

I shook my head. "Weird things happen around me sometimes… But I'm always locked in the cupboard under the stairs for them. That's what I was doing when… well… you came."

Professor McGonagall's lips thinned and her nostrils flared. "Isn't it dark in there?"

"The real problem is the spiders, ma'am," I said matter of factly. Then, at her expression, I added, "If you're looking to murder someone, might I suggest one of the farm animals?"

Professor McGonagall stopped - then chuckled reluctantly. I smiled.

"Alright, Mr Potter. Make us some tea. We'll take it into the sitting room and I shall explain everything."

I was used to doing chores for my aunt and uncle, and that included cooking and making tea. I brewed a pot and brought it obediently with two cups on a large plate. We drew up armchairs before the fireplace, set the tea down on the table between us, and I asked, "So this…"

"Wizarding world," Professor McGonagall offered, sipping. She seemed pleasantly surprised by the taste. I got the feeling ten-year-olds didn't make her good cups of tea very often.

"Yes, this wizarding world, full of… witches and wizards?" Professor McGonagall nodded. "What is it like?" I asked hungrily.

"It is set in pockets. We use Undetectable Expansion charms and Notice Me Not charms - which are exactly as they sound like, and which are heavily regulated by our Ministry, I might add. And we hide in little pockets among Muggle places. A shopping center hidden away in one city, a few houses on the edge of a village. There are less of us, which makes it easier."

"How does one travel from pocket to pocket? Where is the Ministry located and what does it do? Where is the school located?"

"There are several methods of travel. Adults can Apparate, or teleport, and people age twelve and over can use brooms. Floo powder is a method of traveling from wizarding fireplace to wizarding fireplace."

"Do all wizards have fireplaces?"

"Yes. We do have technomagic, technology that can exist alongside magic, but for the most part electricity doesn't function properly around magic. So we still use many old-fashioned things: fireplaces, candles, parchment and quills, messenger owls. Our architecture is old-fashioned, and we mostly use Victorian-era wear and robes. I have heard Muggleborns call it quite peculiar. A woman can be in a Victorian-era robe dress on a cobblestone street and she can have tattoos and suddenly whip out a cell phone."

"What are Muggleborns?"

"Wizards and witches can be born to Muggle-magic marriages, and also to Muggle-Muggle marriages. Additionally, there is no sexism, racism, or homophobia in the wizarding world. Same sex marriage is legal, and same sex couples can even have children - they grow in little bubbles inside St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries."

"How do Muggleborns know how to get to school? Do you come to them as well?"

"Precisely. Now, as to your other questions…"

"I asked about the Ministry and the school," I offered excitedly when she paused.

"Right. The Ministry is located in London, in a hidden location. One of its jobs is to hide the wizarding world from Muggles -"

"Why?"

"We first separated because of the medieval witch hunts," said Professor McGonagall. "Most adult witches and wizards could escape Muggle clutches, but Muggles did often used to set fire to wizarding children. In fact, the only kind of discrimination that exists in the wizarding world is based on blood. Muggleborns and Halfbloods experience a kind of discrimination that Purebloods don't. Some wizards still do genuinely hate Muggles, and distrust them.

"That's why we hold no other kind of discrimination. We know what it's like to be discriminated against. Think of how you were treated by your aunt and uncle, who did, after all, know that you were a wizard."

I thought about it and hot anger filled me, a frown coming over my face.

"That's true," I said, "but taking it out on Muggleborns isn't right either. I mean, I'm practically a Muggleborn myself, but that doesn't mean I hate wizards. Why can't we all just hate Muggles equally and not hate each other?"

Professor McGonagall offered her first, rare smile. "Precisely, Mr Potter," she said. "Precisely."

I smiled, feeling warm.

"In any case, say we reveal ourselves and we're not burned at the stake. What's the alternative? That Muggles ask us to do everything with our magic, and stop doing anything for themselves? That Muggles try to copy or steal our magic? Where is the good possibility here?

"There are some Muggles who are capable of successfully accepting the idea of magic," Professor McGonagall admitted. "There are successful Muggle-wizard marriages. But not many. My parents certainly were not one, and it's made me wary of advocating anything of the sort."

"What happened?" I asked.

Professor McGonagall was reserved. "My mother was forced to give up her magic for my Presbyterian father. She spent her entire life envying me.

"On the note of religion, wizards and witches accept all religions, but the essential wizarding religion is closest to Wiccan in nature. It's because we're descendants of the Druids.

"Other wizarding countries besides Britain, obviously, have their own wizarding histories and religions."

"So we're everywhere?" I guessed.

"Essentially," Professor McGonagall agreed.

"What else can you tell me about the Ministry?"

"Well, that aside it has everything a Muggle government has. It's elected by vote. It has a law sector, a high court, a sector for transportation, for games and sports, for protection against Dark witches and wizards -"

"Dark?"

"Violent," Professor McGonagall clarified. "Illegal. They're sent by Aurors, or policemen, to Azkaban, an island fortress prison guarded by Dark creatures called Dementors. I used to work for the Ministry before I became a professor, so I know it well."

"So do wizards have careers? Newspapers? Music? Sports?"

"Yes to all of those things. The biggest sport is Quidditch, played on flying broomsticks. I played it myself while I was at Hogwarts. We have newspapers and magazines. Our music combines old instruments with new sounds, rather like steampunk. Wizarding careers often have crossovers to Muggle careers. You can be a working class shop clerk or caretaker. You can be a Healer, teacher, government worker, banker, Auror, reporter. You can go into the arts or the sports sector. Or you can do something magical - Potioneers work for the Apothecaries, for example, or wandmakers, and we have people in magical research and invention. Our government even has a magical research division, the Department of Mysteries."

"What about the school?" I asked. "What's it like?"

"It is located in the Highlands of Scotland, out on wild ground in the middle of nowhere. It and the village attached to it, Hogsmeade, are surrounded by anti-Muggle enchantments. It is a medieval stone castle, and it is called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It runs on a seven-year-training program, with entrance exams into higher levels along the way. It has four school houses, it is a boarding school, and it runs on a Prefect and Head Boy and Girl system."

"How do I get there?"

"You take a train. We do have trains and buses. But the acceptance letters haven't even been sent out yet, and term doesn't start until September first."

"So how do I travel to the wizarding world without Floo powder?" I asked.

"You come with me at first, and then later once you have your wand you can take the bus," said Professor McGonagall.

I nodded and thought about it for a minute. "Now I want to know about my parents," I said at last. "You said they were a witch and wizard? How did they die?"

"Your mother was a Muggleborn, your father a Pureblood. They both went to Hogwarts before you. They fought in a great civil war in our world. You see, there was a man, and we're not supposed to say his name but it was Lord Voldemort. Most people are still afraid to speak it, you see. He had two goals: immortality, and to wipe everything but Purebloods from the face of the earth. He gathered up an army full of people and Dark creatures who thought like he did, and began a civil war against the Ministry. He killed many people in horrific ways.

"Your parents fought on the side of the Light, defending Muggles and Muggleborns. They became political targets and had to go into hiding, where they gave birth to and christened you. But Lord Voldemort - or, well, you're supposed to call him You Know Who - he found them, and killed them in front of you. You were a baby. Then he tried to kill you. For some reason, the unblockable Killing Curse rebounded, and he died instead. That's where you got that curse scar on your forehead. That's where the curse rebounded.

"Without him, his entire side fell apart, and the Light won the war. You're quite famous in our world. You're known as the Boy Who Lived. You were sent to your aunt and uncle because they were your only living family, and because it was thought blood magic could protect you better. We see where that got you. Dumbledore, the leader of the war movement and the head of Hogwarts, can sometimes be overly optimistic when it comes to people overcoming the darkness inside them.

"I suspect your aunt and uncle have treated you badly all these years out of some combination of bitterness and fear."

I nodded, looking downward. "Sometimes I have dreams," I said suddenly. "Of a flash of green light, a burning pain on my forehead. A woman screaming and a man laughing in this high, hysterical, cruel way. It's all mixed up and confused in my head. Could that be… could that be a memory?" I looked up.

Professor McGonagall blinked back sudden tears. "The Killing Curse is green. Your mother was found near you, trying to shield you from a curse," she managed.

And suddenly I was trying very hard not to cry as well.

Professor McGonagall put a hand over mine. "I'm terribly sorry, Mr Potter," she said in a shaky voice. "Your parents were good people and they loved you very much. You must know that."

"What were they like?"

She straightened. "Their names were Lily and James Potter," she said, obviously trying to inject some cheer into the conversation. "They were a very talented witch and wizard. Your mother had red hair, and green eyes just like yours. And your father looked very much like you - the same messy black hair and glasses, for example - but his eyes were hazel. Your mother was an exceptionally kind person and an excellent student. Your father was a troublemaker with a great sense of humor and a love for sports. I had both of them as students as well."

"So you've been around a while," I guessed.

Professor McGonagall smirked wryly. "Wizards and witches age slower than Muggles, Mr Potter," she said.

I nodded. "I don't feel famous," I admitted. "Or special. Like you say I am."

"If you did feel like that, Mr Potter, I would be worried," said Professor McGonagall dryly.

"So - those things that happened around me. The weird stuff. It was all my magic?"

"Yes, it's called accidental magic, and it's quite healthy," said Professor McGonagall, nodding. "Even something celebratory. Certainly not worth punishment.

"If I may ask, what kinds of things can you do?"

"Move things without touching them. Change color, shape, and size. Make things vanish and reappear. Move myself high up into the air. Change my own appearance - make my hair regrow, you know, that sort of thing. Oh! And I can speak to snakes."

Professor McGonagall suddenly froze.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Parseltongue, or snake speak, is seen as a sign of Dark magic…" she admitted. "The last person who could do it was Lord Voldemort himself."

"But - but I don't want to be like the person who killed my parents!" I said, panicked.

"Relax, Mr Potter, it's just a silly myth. I was warning you not to go blathering about snake speak, that's all. St Patrick was a Parselmouth."

I relaxed a little.

"If I may recommend," said Professor McGonagall, "Parselmouths among the good have written studies of snake speak. And accidental magic can be sensed out and turned to wandless magic. You seem to have great raw power, so that's something to keep in mind."

"So I'm actually strong?" I asked, perking up, interested.

"Most children don't start learning magic until they get to Hogwarts. And your accidental magic shows unusual strength, yes," said Professor McGonagall after a moment, nodding. "Don't let it go to your head."

"Yes, ma'am," I said, smiling.

"Do you have any further questions for me, Mr Potter?" Professor McGonagall asked.

"What about money?" I asked.

"Hogwarts is a public school with a student's fund," said Professor McGonagall smoothly. I would find out later that there was more to this than she was willing to tell me in the Dursleys' house, but for now she let that be. "Anything else?"

"... No, ma'am, I just can't wait to get started," I admitted.

"Excellent. Then I have some questions for you."

I straightened, uncertain. "Will they affect whether or not I get to go to Hogwarts?"

"Not a single one," Professor McGonagall affirmed.

"... Okay," I said slowly. "Fire away."

"Why are there no pictures of you on the living room walls?"

I was startled. I hadn't even realized our tea was finished or that she'd noticed the walls. "Because my relatives don't like me, ma'am," I said.

"Do they feed you?"

"They don't starve me. But I'm never allowed to eat as much as I'd like."

"Do they assign you chores?"

"Lots of them."

"When did that start?"

"About age… four or five."

"Where do you sleep?"

"In the cupboard."

"The same cupboard they lock you into?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"With the spiders?"

"... Yes, ma'am."

"Why do your clothes look that way?"

"All I ever get are old hand me downs of Dudley's."

"Why are your glasses broken?"

"Because Dudley likes to beat me up."

"And your aunt and uncle do nothing to stop this?"

"No, ma'am."

"Do you have any friends?"

"I'm not allowed them."

"Go anywhere fun?"

"I'm not allowed that either. I'm not allowed fun, or imagination of any kind."

"What about your birthday?"

"Not usually celebrated. I never get money or presents, either, before you ask."

"How do they speak to you? Do they show you love? Affection?"

I snorted. Professor McGonagall raised an eyebrow.

"Look, Professor, I'll save you the trouble. Uncle Vernon's a jackass, Dudley's a moron, Aunt Petunia's spiteful, they all hate me, and none of them want me around ever. They tell me so. They call me a freak."

"They call you names and say they wish you didn't exist?"

"They say I cost too much to keep around," I clarified.

"Any threats?"

"All the time."

"Of cupboard punishments or physical abuse?"

"... Yes, ma'am. Look, I'm not abused." I blinked in surprise as Professor McGonagall stared at me. "I'm not. But -"

"Does anyone besides your cousin ever makes grabs at you?"

"... Yes. My uncle."

"What does he do if he catches you?"

"Pins me against the wall. Shakes me." I was deeply uncomfortable. "Look, I'm not some abuse victim," I protested. "I'm not."

Professor McGonagall stared at me. "With all due respect, Mr Potter," she said quietly, "that is in fact what most abuse victims say."

I stood, suddenly furious. I wanted to order her out of the house, but at the same time I didn't and I was afraid. It was very confusing. "... This conversation is over," I said at last, teeth gritted, and I made to stalk out of the room.

"Mr Potter, it most certainly is not! Steps must be taken to remedy this!" Professor McGonagall called, standing, after me. "... Either you let me help you or I cannot allow you to Hogwarts!"

I paused.

"You would be a liability," she said into the silence.

"... I thought you said my answers wouldn't affect my entry."

"And I thought you would be willing to accept help."

I whirled around. "I'll accept your help if you get them to stop mistreating me!" I snapped. "Blood protection or no blood protection! Or you can just leave them as farm animals; see if I care."

I had gone from smiling and eager to having a very ugly look. Professor McGonagall seemed stunned.

"... Very well, Mr Potter," she said at last, shaken. "Let's see what we can do."

* * *

On her orders, I took all my things from my cupboard room and carried them upstairs to Dudley's second bedroom. She cleared all the old junk out of the way with a wave of her wand and let me set my things down on the brand new bed. I sat there, staring around myself for a moment.

"Stand on the landing," she told me. "Watch and listen."

So I did, hiding in the shadows. She advanced on the animals with her wand - they squealed and stumbled over each other - and in a flash of violet light they were people, Aunt Petunia and Dudley hiding behind Uncle Vernon. Professor McGonagall put her wand directly into Uncle Vernon's face. All three Dursleys were pale and terrified, silent and frightened.

I had never seen them look like that before. Magic alone seemed to unhinge them.

"Here are the rules," said Professor McGonagall. "Harry Potter is going to be a wizard. That is final. However, I would like for this to disturb your life as little as possible." Uncle Vernon looked as skeptical as I was. "Therefore, this is how it will go.

"Harry will make his own meals. He is to be allowed any food he would like. He will only leave his bedroom and enter the rest of the house for food, for bathroom breaks, or to leave the house entirely. You are never to enter his bedroom, or to have any contact with him. He, in turn, can have no contact with you. You are not to control him in any way; he is not to speak to you.

"If these rules are broken, I will know and there will be consequences.

"Myself and one other witch will be coming and going from this house for the rest of the summer. We will not be entering through the front door and up the stairs. We will appear from Harry's bedroom, and disappear from Harry's bedroom. You will have no contact with us. You cannot stop our entry.

"Is this clear?"

Somehow, she managed to make her soft, matter of fact speaking extraordinarily intimidating. Uncle Vernon nodded, some shade of grey in the face, shaking.

"Very well," said Professor McGonagall, putting her wand away. "I will now go back upstairs with your nephew, and disturb you no further."

And, as I watched in amazement, she walked away.

I was free of them. They were free of me. It was a miracle.

"Now," said Professor McGonagall back in my new bedroom, coming to stand in front of me, "myself and the school Healer, Poppy Pomfrey, will meet with you twice a week over the rest of the summer in a two person team. I will be there to assist you; she will be there as your counselor. These meetings will continue once you arrive at Hogwarts.

"There is, of course, a secrecy clause. Unless you intend to hurt yourself, neither of us can talk about anything you have said in our meetings. But they are essentially therapy."

"Can it be three times a week?" I asked.

"That's a change of pace," Professor McGonagall said in surprise.

"... I'd like someone to talk to," I admitted, wincing.

"... Very well," said Professor McGonagall, her eyes surprisingly understanding. "And of course, once the acceptance letters are sent out, we will help you with that. But for now, just focus on… on your own well-being," she said at last.

I nodded. She was, after all, my teacher, and she had already gained my firm loyalty. "Yes, ma'am," I said.

I resolved myself I would try and listen to anything she and Poppy Pomfrey had to teach me. Even if I didn't like it.

My dream had come true. Someone my parents had known had come to save me, after all.


	2. Chapter 2

2.

Professor McGonagall was as good as her word. She brought Madam Pomfrey, a curly blonde-haired older woman with streaks of grey in the honey color, with her the very next day, the two of them arriving suddenly in my bedroom that afternoon with a little pop.

I'll give Madam Pomfrey this, she didn't waste any time doting over me. Matter of fact and professional, she just sat down across from me in my new bedroom and got straight down to business, Professor McGonagall at our side.

The following chapters are a tale of some interweaving subjects we worked on.

She spent the first session asking me to recount what I had told Professor McGonagall, getting a general overview of my childhood and my mental state.

"Do you know much about yourself, Harry?" she asked, probing. "About the things you like and dislike? In music, for example?"

I blinked, sitting back and thinking about it. "I was never allowed things to like or dislike, ma'am," I said, realizing it as I said it.

"And you don't know much about your parents."

"No, ma'am."

"Harry, I'm your counselor. Madam Pomfrey is perfectly fine."

I blushed. "Yes, m - Madam Pomfrey."

She gave me a small smile. "Your manners are exemplary, Harry, but you don't have to worry about offending me," she said. "I'm fairly tough. This room is very bare. Are you happy with it?"

I shrugged. "It's a bedroom," I said. "I've never had a bedroom before."

She nodded thoughtfully, taking this in. "How do you feel about yourself, Harry?" she asked next.

"I… don't really like myself," I admitted. I had to struggle to hold back the 'ma'am.' "I don't hate myself, but I don't find myself particularly… I don't know… talented, or special, or attractive." I blushed again. The admittance made me uneasy.

Madam Pomfrey and Professor McGonagall shared a look. "I disagree, Harry," was all Madam Pomfrey said. "I hope to show you that you're wrong about yourself."

And then the next session, we just dived right into the hard stuff. The so-called abuse.

"You say you haven't been abused," said Madam Pomfrey.

"... I haven't."

"But you would at least classify what you have been through as mistreatment," Madam Pomfrey confirmed. "That's what you called it with Professor McGonagall."

I paused, remembering that moment. I'd shouted it in a fit of anger.

"Well, yeah, the way they treated me was bad," I admitted at last. "I know that."

"So you would agree that it was wrong?"

"... Yes."

"That's a good start," said Madam Pomfrey. "You're right, Harry. The way they treated you is bad, it is mistreatment, and it is wrong. You have every right to feel that way. Your feelings are perfectly valid, and your instincts are correct.

"But why wouldn't you classify it as abuse? Explain that to me. I'm genuinely listening. You know more about what's happened than I do."

I took a deep breath. "Because I'm not some victim," I said, determined. "I mean… it's not like they hit me or anything."

"Let's deconstruct that," said Madam Pomfrey, sitting back, and I felt dread form in the pit of my stomach. "First - wouldn't you agree, Harry, that some abuse does not involve people hitting other people?"

"Yes, ma'am, but that's not what I went through."

"What you went through is not neglect or verbal and emotional abuse."

"That's correct."

"What does verbal and emotional abuse consist of, then, if I might ask?" She wasn't being sarcastic. In fact, I couldn't tell what she was being at all. She just sat there and looked at me. Professor McGonagall, too, was uncharacteristically still and silent.

"Emotional abuse involves making people feel bad about themselves," I said. "Name calling, telling people they're worthless, telling them -"

I paused. All those things had happened to me.

Madam Pomfrey allowed herself a small, sympathetic smile. "You have also said, Harry, that your uncle sometimes grabs you in a violent way. Doesn't that qualify as physical abuse?"

I sat there, completely still. Suddenly silent.

"What about the way your cousin beats you up? You can't tell me that doesn't qualify as sibling abuse."

"Sibling abuse is a thing?"

"It most certainly is," said Madam Pomfrey, nodding.

"... Oh," I said. Then she was right. If Dudley wasn't abusive, who was? And Professor McGonagall had already told me - abuse victims said they hadn't been abused all the time, and even believed it. "So… what I'm telling you, and thinking… it's a natural thing for an abuse victim to think?"

"Most people have trouble classifying experiences that have happened to them as abusive, yes," said Madam Pomfrey, nodding. "It can take them a long time to come to terms with the idea."

"But - but I'm not a victim!" I protested. "I mean, I don't act like one -!"

"Most people don't."

"What?" I stopped and stared at her.

"If all abuse victims were easy to spot, Harry, we would have far less problems in society. Most abuse victims don't act like downtrodden little mice, or walk around acting injured all the time."

"I think, Harry," said Professor McGonagall, "that it would be useful at this point to classify what we mean by 'victim.' A victim in this case is not someone who walks around acting injured all the time. Rather, it is someone that something terrible has happened to, even if they try to bear up remarkably well under it."

"I just… I keep thinking about the way the Dursleys would get angry or mock me if I called myself an abuse victim," I admitted. "And I get embarrassed."

"They are still controlling that area of your thoughts, even when not physically present," said Madam Pomfrey, nodding. "That is common. But Harry, you are allowed to see negative treatment of you by your family as abusive. That is a feeling you are perfectly allowed to have."

Something I hadn't been aware I was holding inside me relaxed.

"Professor McGonagall is right, you are bearing up remarkably well under abuse, Harry," said Madam Pomfrey, with me sitting before her full of mixed emotions. "But - and this is the most cliched line in therapeutic history - how did your relatives make you feel? About life, yourself, the world?"

I was desperately uncomfortable, so I decided to answer her questions mechanically in the order she had asked them. "Horrible about life. Bitter and miserable about the world." I paused, thinking of myself - the way I saw myself. "Like I said, I don't hate myself - but I don't like myself either."

"Do you think that could be due to your abuse?" Madam Pomfrey asked thoughtfully. Still, she revealed nothing.

"Well - I tried not to let what the Dursleys said affect me," I protested.

"Of course, and that is a very brave thing to have done -"

"I don't feel brave."

"And yet you are," said Professor McGonagall matter of factly, and I blushed, strangely pleased.

"But do you think it is possible they could have had some effect anyway?"

I paused, and considered this idea. I realized she could be right. And a strange fury toward my relatives filled me. "Damn them!" I suddenly spat, swearing, yelling. "Damn them!"

"That may in fact be a healthier reaction compared to before," said Professor McGonagall dryly.

"Yes. We can work on you feeling angry and upset, Harry," said Madam Pomfrey. "But no matter how much you don't want to, you must allow yourself to reflect. You must allow the memories and emotions to come forward first."

So three times a week, we went through countless individual memories I had of… the abuse… and Madam Pomfrey and Professor McGonagall began putting up silencing charms and giving me useless items so I could yell and throw things at walls. Therapy sessions could bother me and make me emotional like nothing else could, but there was this weird, almost therapeutic, primal scream quality to them.

All of a sudden, I became a quieter, almost more upset, angrier person. It was like I'd been repressing things for years and all of a sudden they all came to the forefront. I wished I could shout at my relatives, confront them, but they treated me as coldly as I treated them. We pretended not to notice we were living in the same house together.

Another thing Madam Pomfrey talked over with me was my desire for love. She didn't start out like that, though. If she had, she'd have sounded cheesy and I'd have dismissed her or blown her off. So instead, she started more subtle.

"What do you want most, Harry?" she asked out of the blue - guessing, I think, what the answer would be.

I blushed. "I want family or friends - people who care about me," I muttered.

"Would you do anything to have that?"

"... Yes," I admitted, pained.

"Would you change yourself or not say things to suit them? Is that why you're always so polite to the two of us?" Professor McGonagall asked suddenly. "Because you're afraid of offending us or losing us?"

My eyes had widened. "Well… I wouldn't do anything bad!" I protested.

"That's very good," said Madam Pomfrey, nodding. "But otherwise?"

"... Yeah. I'd do almost anything," I admitted. "That's… that's not necessarily a good thing, is it? That I'd do anything for the first person who was nice to me?"

"Love, family, and friendship are important, Harry. But you certainly shouldn't make yourself easy to prey on or manipulate. Of course, going around thinking everyone's out to get you is not good either. But instant loyalty, changing yourself, a fear of rejection - those are not good things. We will help you in these sessions to come to grips with choosing your loyalty, and being yourself even in the face of possible rejection."

So we talked - and here was where I got very emotional, surprising myself, actually - about a desire for love, family, and friends. One thing that came out was my pain over the death of my parents.

"I just wish I at least remembered them, or had gotten to know them," I told Madam Pomfrey. "All I remember is my mother dying. I have no one."

"You will find people, Harry," Madam Pomfrey promised me. "Especially at Hogwarts. You will not be alone forever. Our job is to help you learn how to choose the right people."

"You also have us," said Professor McGonagall. "You are no longer really alone. And if it would help, you can talk about what you remember of your mother's death."

I managed a smile.

So between coming to grips with the idea and specifics of abuse, addressing my (desperation?) for affection, and helping me come to terms with my parents' deaths and my own confused memories of them… We had a lot of ground to cover right from the beginning.

We spent quite a bit of time with this, and those were very raw, emotional times for me. I felt like someone had scratched at my insides and left marks. Slowly, we continued with this, but we also moved on with part of our sessions to other things…

"I want you to get to know yourself better, Harry," said Madam Pomfrey, determined. "And Professor McGonagall and I are going to help you."

From the first, I was skeptical. By that point, I really should have had more faith.


	3. Chapter 3

3.

I started out by taking a grueling seventy-question quiz - each question thought provoking - to discover my supposed personality type. I had no idea how this would help anything.

"I think having to answer all those questions just made my trauma worse," I joked. I still hadn't managed to get rid of the 'ma'am' instinct.

"Harry, be serious," said Professor McGonagall, giving me a stern look over her the top of her glasses. I piped down obediently, but I had noticed that at some point I had gone from 'Mr Potter' to 'Harry.'

"Let's go over the results with you. You tested out as an ISFP," said Madam Pomfrey.

"Is that bad?" I asked, deadpan. I was only sort of kidding.

"No. There is no such thing as a 'bad' personality type. Everyone interacts with the world in their own way," said Madam Pomfrey, taking my question seriously. "I would like to emphasize to you that there is nothing wrong with anything I am about to explain to you. You have your own way of interacting with the world, and that is fine. The point is to become aware of yourself, and to use that to your advantage."

"Okay…" I said uncertainly. Was she going to tell me something I had a problem with?

"I is for introvert. This does not mean you're shy, timid, or socially crippled. It simply means that interactions with other people drain you - even if you're enjoying yourself, you are more tired after they are over. Meanwhile, spending time on your own fills you with energy; it's how you recharge."

I blinked, considering this. I had never consciously thought of it like that before. "So… I should limit the amount of interaction I have with other people? And time on my own is good?"

"Precisely," said Madam Pomfrey. "Introverts are more prone to having smaller but closer groups of friends, to getting overwhelmed in large-scale social situations or under constant socialization, and to being rather quiet because they don't like blurting things out that have no point or purpose."

"So I don't say stupid things," I translated, "or have tons of friends."

"Does having tons of friends really matter to you, Harry? Would you rather know lots of people or feel you can trust the ones you know?"

"... Point," I admitted.

"The S is for sensory. This means that you are focused on real-world actions, what's going on in the world around you. It takes effort, meanwhile, for you to think abstractly or reflect internally. This doesn't mean you're stupid, and it doesn't mean you don't enjoy turning inward. It just means that takes effort for you. Focusing on observing the world around you, meanwhile, is extremely easy for you, as is describing the world in concrete, physical terms."

"Well, yeah," I said. "I've always been observant. I'm good at spotting what other people don't."

"You're small and fast, too," Professor McGonagall mused.

"What does that have to do with anything?" I asked, confused. I was finally starting to be more honest around the two of them.

"Oh, nothing. You would just make for an ideal Seeker. It's a Quidditch position," said Professor McGonagall. "The main qualifications are being observant, small, light, and fast."

I filed this away for future reference.

"The F is for feeling. It means you think with your heart, rather than your head."

"Is that… bad?" I asked, blushing.

"Not necessarily. As I said, it's just one way of dealing with the world. You work based off of your emotions, even if as an introvert you aren't always very good at loudly expressing them. You try to do what's right, what feels good, you focus on kindness and compassion, passion and love. It's not necessarily a bad thing.

"The P, meanwhile, stands for perception. This means that you are not a list maker, a calendar person, or a schedule planner. You can act rather impulsively, but on the other hand you also have a talent for spontaneity, an acceptance of the messier side of life." She looked wryly around my bedroom; I was a bit embarrassed by how disordered it had already become.

"So I'm quiet and introverted, yet impulsive, spontaneous, and emotional?" I asked. "And I'm focused on the real world and observant?"

"Essentially," Madam Pomfrey agreed. "Now let's look at it all together. Much research has been done into the specifics of the ISFP, and I'll go over some of it with you.

"ISFPs are sometimes The Composers of the world. You look confused," she added in amusement, and indeed I was confused. "Composing is not just writing music. It is expressing any aspect of the world of the senses. You have unusually keen senses, Harry. You are sensitive to everything from shades of color to textures to the most intimate details of taste. Where other people say purple, you say plum. Where other people say tasty, you say spicy yet salty. And you are unusually sensitive to touch. You can probably pick out sounds in a piece of music, for example, better than most people can, and you would probably smell food burning before anyone else."

I thought about it. "I've never really noticed that before," I admitted thoughtfully.

"You probably just unconsciously categorized it as an extension of being observant, if you noticed it at all," said Madam Pomfrey. "But it is true of you, I'm sure you'll notice if you start paying attention to it. This makes Composers unusually good at organizing and creatively expressing nuances of the senses."

"Poppy, we may need to lower the explanation a bit, the boy's only ten," said Professor McGonagall dryly, and thank God she did, because I was completely bewildered.

"Right, sorry. I just get so excited!" She beamed with enthusiasm, and I smiled in dry amusement despite myself. "What this means is that you would make an unusually good chef or food critic, an unusually good composer or creator of music, an unusually good purchaser or fashion designer, an unusually good player in tactile subjects such as sports or dance… You see what I mean. Since you're so good with the senses, you're also good at creating things using the senses.

"Performance is not your thing. Creation is. Artistic expression is."

"That part, I can really get behind. But as for things I'm good at… I'd never really noticed it before," I admitted. "Physical activities, musical activities, I mean, I was never allowed to enjoy or participate in any of that. Even cooking, until recently, I did for other people, because I had to."

"One of the things we can work with in the future is helping you find and enjoy hobbies that involve the senses, and if you'd like that could include cooking," Professor McGonagall offered. "You could sort of reclaim cooking, so to speak, and make it enjoyable for yourself. Even magic is… I mean, it's mostly a physical expression. It's instinctive."

I was overwhelmed by the sudden choices before me. How on earth would I decide how to choose only two or three? Hobbies involving the senses - that was pretty broad. Could I really have a natural talent for such a wide variety of things? And for magical creation?

"There are some traits common to all SPs that you also should know about," said Madam Pomfrey. "SPs have some other things in common. They usually have a total disregard for the rules." Professor McGonagall's lips pursed and I resisted the urge to smile. "They are good at the arts and crafts, any move the next of which is a free variable - any activity that allows them room to move around in is suited to them. They're also occupied with technique, which simply means they have an unbounded ability to work away at physical techniques, impervious to pain and suffering, until they have an act mastered perfectly. And they work very well with tools and equipment.

"Enjoyment, fun, and pleasure are very important to SPs - it is very important to them that they enjoy themselves, and this combined with their capacity for impulsiveness and risk can sometimes lead to negative situations. This could range from a dangerous act to an addiction.

"They are optimistic about the future, cynical when it comes to the nature of evil and the motives of others, and they very much live in the present. They don't worry too much about the past or the future, which can actually be of great benefit to a person's mental health, even if perhaps a bit more worrying about other things might also bring benefits.

"They try to adapt to any situation. They want to be seen as brave, even rebellious. They yearn to have an impact on others, and to be ultra-talented. Generosity toward others, the capacity to give of what they have, is very important to them. They tend not to be extraordinarily charming or diplomatic - rather, they are characterized by their honesty, even their bluntness.

"ISFPs in particular tend to be friendly, quiet, and reserved, so that's another aspect to add to your overall personality structure."

"Weird. I can identify with all of that," I said, mystified.

"Psychology. It's a thing," said Madam Pomfrey flatly, and I snorted, smiling reluctantly. "Would you like to hear some more research that has been done into your personality type?"

"Yeah!" I said, sitting forward. I had expected for it all to be boring and for none of it to work, but this was actually interesting.

"ISFPs are difficult to observe. They're not good at expressing themselves verbally, or through facial expressions. Rather, they express themselves through their arts - that art could be the written word, painting, a sport, any kind of art. So while they are extremely quiet and reserved, sometimes to the point of rarely speaking, you see their personality in what they come out with. That could be personal expression in a piece of charm-work, it could be an artistic move, it could be a poem or a drawing or a recipe.

"In order for others to get to know you, they must see what you do, not what you say or what you show. ISFPs tend to say and show very little, and you should perhaps not try to fight that. Some amount of speaking is necessary, but don't feel the need to strain yourself by expressing yourself verbally."

I nodded thoughtfully. In a weird sort of way, it made sense. "I don't think my art is the written word," I commented. "My letters are, like, three sentences long." I smiled.

"Well, that's fine," said Madam Pomfrey, smiling back. "Professor McGonagall and I will help you find other ways of expressing yourself. For now, perhaps get comfortable being yourself, being a bit more quiet and reserved and finding a way to be okay with that.

"That's the whole point of this section. To help you understand yourself, and to give you permission to be yourself.

"More about artistry in SPs - artistry, remember, being more than music or sculpting. ISFPs usually work on their arts alone at least some of the time, and they can put many long, lonely hours into mastering their arts, not noticing any of the pain the art may be putting them through. But they also play around with their arts very impulsively. They don't set themselves to one task and do the same thing for hours on end. Rather, they are artistic impulsively, doing whatever feels right in the moment, seized by the act itself.

"SPs tend to be the type most successful in the arts. If they were all very dutiful and sensible, they would be SJs, a different type altogether. The SPs' special combination of hard work and completely impulsive risk makes them positive livewires in any kind of art - in business, in sports, in show business, even in things like show-flying and magical experimentation. Anything that allows them the freedom to express their impulsivity and creativity, anything that allows them room to maneuver, they can excel in.

"ISFPs are capable of fantastical artistic works. This cannot be overemphasized, Harry. You're looking at me like I just grew six heads, but it is true. You are capable of fantastical artistic works."

"... It's going to take me awhile, to get used to that idea," I admitted.

"That's okay," said Madam Pomfrey. "And I'll give you another idea to get used to: ISFPs are the most unconditionally kind people of any personality type in the entire world." My eyes widened. "It's true. I'm not exaggerating. They are sensitive to other people's pain and try to help it whenever possible. They are good with children, better than I think you'd give yourself credit for, and also with animals. They tend to have a fascination with nature, the bucolic."

She gave me some time to think about this for awhile.

"I don't know about children," I said, "but I know I have always liked animals, thinking about it. Respected them, you know. And I have always enjoyed nature and the countryside. I've noticed the seasons, you know.

"We're really good with children?" I added curiously. "I just always… you know… assumed I'd make for a bad parent." I blushed. "I don't know why, I just… did."

"ISFPs are exceptionally kind, and good with animals, children, and nature," said Madam Pomfrey firmly, nodding. "So give yourself more credit. A couple of more things. Traditional schooling, lectures and textbooks and notes, hold little interest for ISFPs; they do not challenge ISFPs or their special talents. Physical techniques, however - from gardening herbs to brewing potions to doing spells - should be quite natural for them once they've gotten the hang of it."

"So I expect good grades in physically based tests," Professor McGonagall added unexpectedly. "And if I don't get them, I shall be seriously inquiring into what the problem is."

"Yes, ma'am," I said, swallowing.

"In jobs, an ISFP must choose something that allows them room to maneuver," said Madam Pomfrey. "They must choose free, variable actions and be rewarded for doing them. This has a wide range - you could work as a magical experimenter for the Department of Mysteries or you could be a painter. But remember, in order to be happy, you cannot get bogged down in cold, dutiful necessities and technicalities and paperwork."

"So what jobs are good for SPs?" I wondered.

"Well, you could work in design or purchasing, in the business sector. Magical research or potion brewing and invention would be your thing in the magical sector. Any of the arts, whether physical or artistic, would be good for you. Healing, dealing with animals, or anything involving nature, such as landscape gardening, would satisfy your natural kindness. Teaching would be a good way to be free-form and creative and also help children."

I was scribbling notes down now. I had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. This gave me a blue-print.

"So that's me in careers," I said. "What about, you know - in a family?"

"In a family and a home, ISFPs need an anchor, so to speak. A safe harbor. They do like to explore and see what's going on in the world, in an impulsive sort of way, but they need someone who's not also an impulsive SP to pull them back in and tether them back to home."

"Wouldn't that lead to fighting?" I wondered.

"Yes, but ISFPs are better with intrafamilial conflict - fighting within the family - than other SPs are. They will stick with their family in order to hold it together. They do need their adventures and their solitary, quiet retreats, but they'll put up with a lot more familial stress than other types - provided, of course, that they themselves are happy.

"ISFPs are excellent friends with their children. They're good at meeting kids at their level, at playing with kids and offering them a kind of friendship not usually found in adults. At the same time, your children also need to see you express yourself through your art, or they won't feel like they've ever gotten to know you either."

I was still note-taking. I looked up, and nodded slowly, almost cautiously.

"That's… actually really helpful," I said.

I'd just learned more about myself in the past couple of hours than I had in my previous eleven years of life.


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's Note:_ These questions are all taken straight from Pottermore and are very easy to look up. More on the subject of self discovery.

* * *

4.

The first time we went through the questions, I was not in a terribly good mood. I'd just talked about the idea behind repression of emotions in the midst of abuse - more specifically, how abusers usually frame things as your fault in terms of what you've done to them, leading you to feel guilty and like you have no right to get angry. This is where the repression of emotions during abuse comes from.

And we'd been deconstructing that, and I was furious because I hadn't even known I did feel guilty or like I had done anything wrong concerning the Dursleys, and I was upset because all these repressed feelings of guilt kept coming back up.

So needless to say, I didn't feel like doing anything else.

"It might make you feel better to focus on something that will hopefully be more fun for a while," Madam Pomfrey urged me.

I sighed. "Well, you're the expert," I admitted, emotionally exhausted. "So I'll just be answering more personality questions?"

"Not exactly. I have here the official Hogwarts personality questions book. I will give you a series of what-if scenarios, and some of them may seem random, but you have to choose a reaction. Don't go with your first instinct here, necessarily. Look at each answer carefully, and decide which answer you want to choose - what kind of person you want to be. I want you to reflect on your instincts and how they differ from the kind of person you want to become," said Madam Pomfrey.

"Keep in mind, Mr Potter," added Professor McGonagall, and that was how I knew she was trying to remain neutral, "we will not be guiding you toward any one specific answer, though we may discuss your results in a neutral way once you have come to a decision. It's up to you to decide what kind of person you want to become."

"Quite right. As with basic personality structure, there is no right or wrong answer. Only different answers," said Madam Pomfrey.

The first question gave me a list of fears and asked me what I feared most. "Well, that one's easy," I said. "I'm fine with my first instinct. Small spaces."

"Explain," said Madam Pomfrey thoughtfully.

"Well, let's look at this," I said. "Darkness and fire are two things you have to get used to that exist commonly in everyday life. Same with heights. And if I feared isolation, I'd have died out ages ago. But I'm fine with fearing small spaces - yes, there's my cupboard, but there's also this… broader idea of being entrapped in a place where I can't move around or get out. That's what I fear most. Not being able to act. So I'm fine with being afraid of being entrapped in small spaces. It's true to my experience and my natural instincts, but it's also something that makes sense to me," I explained.

They looked at me thoughtfully.

"Mr Potter, you are a clever boy, that's quite a detailed answer," said Professor McGonagall after a moment.

I blushed. "Well, I've never thought of myself as unusually intelligent," I muttered. "But I suppose that might be the abuse talking."

So they interrupted to give me a number of puzzles and riddles over a series of a couple of days, and I didn't think I'd do well, but slowly I grew in quick answers and confidence as I realized I usually answered correctly. I was better at thinking things out and giving good answers than I'd ever given myself credit for.

"Just because someone's not good at traditional schooling," said Madam Pomfrey, "doesn't mean they're not clever or intelligent, or a good reader, or anything else. Indeed, cleverness is required to be creative in the artistic pursuits your personality type specializes in."

So that was an interesting realization for me. On Madam Pomfrey's recommendation, I started integrating logical thought more into ordinary life, and I found a kind of calm amid the storm I hadn't entirely expected. Analyzing things helped me react in not such an angry way to them.

Encouraged, I also started analyzing and discussing each answer more as I came across it, discovering more and more about myself and the kind of person I wanted to be.

The next question asked me about my best quality, and that one I had to think really hard on.

"My first instinct is to say my resilience, which has helped me survive," I said. "But I don't know if I want that to be my best quality. It doesn't say much about me except that I've survived horrible things, and I'd kind of like to move beyond that and get to know myself better. So…

"All the other options are also really good," I admitted. "Determination reminds me a bit of resilience, but the rest of them are really excellent. Kindness, optimism, intelligence, imagination. Looking at all these traits… I mean, the other answers are possibilities I really hadn't ever considered."

"It should be like that for all the questions," Madam Pomfrey put in. "That's the point." They were watching me neutrally, letting me talk things out for myself.

"I would say I want to be original," I admitted at last, feeling bold. "That yearning to impress people and make an impact that we talked about before - I really feel that. I want to be an original person, someone who's different and does things in a different way. Is that an arrogant thing to think?"

"Not necessarily," said Madam Pomfrey. "You are ambitious, then? There's nothing wrong with that; it can even be healthy."

"... Yes," I admitted slowly, "I suppose I am." It would take me awhile, to get comfortable with these ideas.

"Ambition and a total disregard for the rules can be quite a deadly combination, Harry," Professor McGonagall commented. "And I mean that in a good way, especially if the person involved has the kind of internal moral compass that you seem to have."

I smiled slightly, a little less embarrassed at getting a compliment than I would have been several weeks ago.

In the next question, I had to choose one item from a trunk full of items. My first instinct was to go for one of the smaller, more visually appealing trinkets, but I didn't exactly want this to be the foremost part of my personality, so I thought hard. I analyzed, as I'd started to do.

"The scroll," I said after a while in realization. "It's obvious. The scroll could have information on it that explains the rest of the trunk. I can't even choose the dagger until I know what I'm supposed to be guarding myself against."

Then I had to choose a path. I didn't understand the point of the question, but I went toward the sea. "Sort of along the line of the idea of needing open, free space," I explained. "The forest and the castle wouldn't allow that, but the seashore would."

I was already getting to know myself better.

The next three question-answers were interrelated. I would most want to be wise and would brew a potion bringing myself wisdom.

"It's one thing I've learned I need," I admitted. "I need to be able to think through bad experiences, not let them define me, and I need to learn where I stand on issues myself."

"One could say you're already wise," Professor McGonagall pointed out. "Right away you identified prejudice against Muggleborns as wrong even though you'd been raised by and hated Muggles yourself."

"I still have a lot to learn," I argued, frowning. "But take that example of Muggle prejudice. I identify with Muggleborns myself, so of course I wouldn't want to destroy them. And I feel free to hate Muggles like my family, but just because you hate someone that doesn't give you the right to hurt or kill them. Which is why I advocated hating in peace.

"You can't turn away legitimate witches and wizards because of where they come from. That's completely unreasonable; they couldn't help it. If you don't think they understand your world, teach them a better way. Include them on lessons you believe to be important.

"That's what I think. I've experienced a lot, and I've been thinking about it a lot lately - and I suppose it's thrown a lot of things into perspective for me. If I treat Muggles badly because of the way I've been treated, I'm really no better than the Dursleys."

That combination of analysis and encouragement to be my own, original self really helped my answer here.

"You certainly have experienced a lot," said Professor McGonagall thoughtfully. "You show unusual wisdom, open mindedness, and tolerance for someone with your experiences and age, Harry. I think you will do well at Hogwarts."

I offered her a small smile.

"You're also quite remote," Madam Pomfrey offered. "I'm glad to see you coming into yourself, Harry. You're not as forced and desperate for affection as before. You seem to be choosier in how you choose to express yourself and bestow affection, and that is a positive. You're very elegant and refined. You show yourself in subtle ways."

"... That's silly," I said simply. "I'm just a person like anyone else. Let's continue."

It marked the first time I'd dismissed a compliment, not because I thought I was unworthy of it, but because I found it irrelevant.

This conversation did affect my third answer, however. Growing comfortable with myself as a clever, wise, and reasonable person, I said I would least like to be called ignorant on an issue.

The next question puzzled me. It asked how I would like people to think of me after I'd died. More remote and unattached to the idea of everlasting affection from others, I said skeptically, "It matters more what they think of me in life, doesn't it? I mean… I would rather be seen as a good person loved by others in my own lifetime. That's more important. What on earth is the use after you're dead?"

That was another instance in which seeing other answers really helped me clarify my own views.

The next set of questions were what I mentally considered more "aesthetic" questions. I chose the sea again, growing attached to the idea and working off of a theme. There was something instinctively romantic about the sea, I felt. That sense of romance also affected how I answered the other questions in this section.

"I seem to have a fascination with the dark aesthetic," I said dryly, half worried. "Is that bad?"

"The dark aesthetic is widely misunderstood," said Madam Pomfrey. "There's a difference between having an attachment to the dark, romantic aesthetic and being a bad person. Perhaps you similarly are a creature of misunderstood darkness? Your reserve and attractions may intimidate people, Harry, but anyone taking the time to get to know you will realize you are quite a good person. You shouldn't let it bother you. Go with where you feel most comfortable."

So I chose Merlin's box with the rune, the violin, the inky visions goblet, and the luminous pool. Call me a romantic if you'd like.

The next set of questions were moral questions. I chose to save the cure, then the book, then the records. I would most want to be trusted by others. I most hated boredom - I'd suffered the rest of it before, I reasoned, hunger, cold, isolation, the whole shebang. I'd been forced to do chores, humiliated, attacked. A captor could do almost anything to me and I would probably take it all casually, but by God I could not stand being bored.

The next question was a thought provoking one. What would I most like to learn at Hogwarts? I thought about it, and realized based on things I had already learned about myself that I'd want to know all of it. "Every area I can," I answered. "I mean… I'm clever, I'm ambitious, I crave wisdom and knowledge, I'm good at instinctive and creative magic, I have lots of potential, and I want to be original. I'd most want to learn everything Hogwarts has to offer me."

"So you want to be a good student?" Professor McGonagall clarified.

"... Yes," I answered, and smiled when she looked relieved. I was determined to get good grades and prove her correct. "I'm fascinated by the wizarding world already, and I want to learn more."

I then decided that I would most want the power to change my appearance - it would be dead useful, I reasoned, and would not have any of the nasty psychological consequences that say being able to read minds or change the past might; I could camouflage myself anywhere, so it would be even more useful than invisibility. And I would most want to learn about ghosts, having a certain morbid dark, romantic fascination with spirits and the dead.

The next question was very tough for me. It was a what-if scenario involving cheating on a test. My first instinct was to brush Flitwick off and confront the cheating classmate instead, but I questioned if this was the right response. If the same points would be gotten either way… I mean, screw my classmate, he had chosen to cheat, right? Why would me confronting him make any difference if he'd already made the decision? (Or she, I supposed.)

So in the end, I didn't tell Flitwick unless he asked, but if he asked about the cheating I told the truth readily. I didn't voluntarily offer information as a snitch, but I was honest if questioned. We all had to make our decisions, I had learned - and I would make mine out to be good ones.

I chose the lantern-lit alley, another aesthetic choice. If confronted by a Muggle, I would fish for more information, asking them in faux bewilderment what made them think I was a wizard. (Hopefully they would be upset or fearful enough to tell me the truth.) If hearing a noise in the dark, I would draw my wand and stand my ground. At the troll bridge, I would attempt to use magic to confuse the troll and let us pass unscathed - which was, after all, a method of solo attack, and a cleverer one at that.

I was starting to fall into a more comfortable rhythm now.

Then we got to the nightmare question. I in the end chose the eye at keyhole nightmare, somewhat disturbed. "I'm trapped, there's something unknown there, and there's no way out," I tried to explain, shaken.

"... You are more vulnerable than you sometimes seem, Mr Potter," Professor McGonagall offered quietly.

The rest of the choices were really snap aesthetic choices. I mostly chose the dark and the interesting: Moon, river, dusk, black, left, tails, thorn, rain, shadow, salt, blood, cold, rough, prowl, think, stone, under, sometimes, why, free, alone, lost, silent, black, mind, listen.

But some answers were more snap moral choices. In these cases, I chose: Hope, advise, lead, improve, seek, discover, and shine (which struck me as more regal than glitter or glow).

At the end of it all, I admitted, "This was interesting but confusing. I don't understand what the point of it all was."

"But you understand yourself better, Mr Potter, yes?" said Madam Pomfrey expectantly. "And the person you'd like to become?"

"... Yes," I admitted slowly, interested. "I do."

She and Professor McGonagall smiled. "Then the point has been realized."


	5. Chapter 5

5.

Some things I did with Professor McGonagall, who also outside of therapy sessions helped me discover more about myself, my likes, and my interests.

She helped me find my favorite things, in everything from food to books to movies. She would buy and bring things over for me and we would try new things together, on the days I had off from therapy. When Minerva McGonagall decided to do something, she put her all into it, and helping me was no different. It was something I really appreciated. She was an incredibly dedicated hard worker when it came to helping me discover my likes and interests.

I found out my favorite food was sushi, and I had a hidden weakness for chocolate. My favorite books were socially and politically driven novels, and my favorite music was classic rock. In movies, I was embarrassed at first by how much I enjoyed love stories of all kinds, both conventional and unconventional. In television, I loved standup comedy and cute, quirky, off the wall humor.

McGonagall bought me all these in spades, and also helped me narrow down the hobbies I wanted to try. I decided music, drawing, and cooking would be my three choices. She not only bought me cookbooks, but small instruments for my room and books with CDs on the violin, the piano, singing, and charcoal drawing in a coffeehouse sort of art style.

At last, my relatives decided to speak to me. Possibly it was the creations I was making a mess with in the kitchen, or the strains of horrible music they could hear from my room, or even the fact that I appeared to be enjoying myself and didn't bother to get angry with them anymore.

"What on earth are you up to up there?" asked Aunt Petunia suspiciously one day, the other two Dursleys glaring over her shoulder.

"I'm building a bomb," I said matter of factly, and as their eyes widened I walked upstairs to my bedroom.

Speaking of my bedroom, Pomfrey and McGonagall helped me decorate it. I made sure it was minimalist, no dustables clutter, no fuss. In colors, I used neutrals, and sophisticated colors like indigo and burgundy. I bought tailored bedding, and various textures instead of patterns. There were lots of clean lines, and very few accessories.

I wanted my bedroom to be a calming, tranquil place, an oasis of sorts, a place where soft, relaxing music played from occasionally. McGonagall even got me to clean up my mess in order to create a more soothing effect, and we put a lock on the door so the Dursleys couldn't enter without my say-so.

I learned a lot about McGonagall during our time together. I discovered she was an Animagus - she could transform into a tabby cat with square, glasses-like markings around its eyes. She also told me she was Deputy Headmistress at Hogwarts, and she was the Transfiguration instructor - she had mastered the complex and difficult magical art of turning one thing into something else.

Both she and Pomfrey became quite motherly toward me, and before long I was calling them Minerva and Poppy. It was odd at first, but something I was happy to get used to.

In addition to increasing my self-awareness, they tried to increase my self-confidence.

"We have, I think, explained to you and showed you your talents and your good points," said Poppy. "But you're not as bad looking as you give yourself credit for, either."

I snorted, raising my eyebrows skeptically.

"Harry, let's do what Poppy likes to do and 'deconstruct' for a minute, okay?" said Minerva. "You have a small, slim body type. Your face is diamond shaped. You are a Winter complexion, with clear pale skin, messy black hair, and very striking almond-shaped bright green eyes from your mother.

"Notice that none of those, as I described them, are inherently bad things.

"But your relatives have purposefully tried to dress you all your life to make you look ugly. The big, baggy, greyish clothing from Dudley does a disservice to both your body type and your complexion. Your round glasses are tailor-made to make your face look long and overly thin. That haircut isn't doing your face shape any favors either - notice it's not the messy hair, but the way the hair is cut, that detracts from your overall appearance.

"Those are all things we can work on, if you'd like, when we go out shopping for your school supplies. We can get you a new look."

I looked at myself in the bedroom mirror that night, and for once, I could start to see what they saw a little bit.

They also told me about my mother.

"You are a great deal like your mother, Harry," Minerva told me, smiling, as Poppy smiled along and nodded. "You look like your father, and may even be good at Quidditch like your father, but it's your mother who I believe you inherited most of your personality from. Like you, she was thoughtful and kind, a clever and excellent student, but she could be quite fiery when she wanted to be. She was loving and an excellent family member and friend, with quite a gift for magic. She hated seeing injustice and she was quite loyal.

"Your father wasn't a bad person, but he was a deliberate and mischievous troublemaker with an attraction toward the traditionally masculine. And that isn't you at all. He was the Pureblood duelist; your mother was the Muggleborn Healer. I think it's clear who you most take after.

"You should embrace the part of you that you inherited from your mother. On top of everything else, she died saving your life."

Minerva even gave me a photo, of my mother and father smiling together in their last year at Hogwarts, as Head Boy and Girl. The photo moved according to a few specific movements and two-dimensional personality specifications, and I drank in hungrily the image of my dead parents, still teenagers, smiling and waving up at me.


	6. Chapter 6

_Author's Note_ : It becomes important in this chapter that this story is set slightly ahead of canon, in 21st century.

* * *

6.

Poppy and Minerva appeared before me enormously excited one day, and I knew it had happened.

"The Hogwarts letters were sent out!" Poppy positively squealed, breaking professionalism for a moment. "Open up, Harry!"

They handed me a yellowish parchment envelope. Written on it in green ink were the words:

Mr H Potter

The Smallest Bedroom

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

It certainly was mine, right down to the wealthy suburb my aunt and uncle lived in. There was no stamp and no return address because, of course, wizards and witches either used messenger owl or text and email. I turned the envelope over and saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms: a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter H. "Draco Dormiens Nunquam Titillandus," said tiny Latin letters around the seal.

"What does the seal mean?" I asked, interested.

"The lion, the eagle, the badger, and the snake represent the four school houses," said Minerva. "Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin."

"And which one will I be in?" I asked.

"That will be decided when you get there," said Minerva.

"You have to try on a talking, mind-reading hat," said Poppy helpfully. Minerva glared at her flatly and I gave her a bewildered look. "What? He does!"

Minerva sighed, rolled her eyes, and turned back to me. "In any case. The H, obviously, represents Hogwarts. The Latin letters are the school motto: 'Never tickle a sleeping dragon'."

"Sage advice," I commented, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, the dragon is meant to represent the school," said Minerva. "With all of its built-in magical self defense mechanisms. Remember, Hogwarts was founded at the time of the witch hunts. It's even built to be large and confusing, to ward off potential intruders."

I was excited to go. Living in a big, confusing medieval castle, learning magic, sounded fascinating.

"I was curious about the witch hunts," I admitted. "Everyone used to call witches Satanic. Magic as the work of the Devil. But wasn't the Devil originally an angel? Doesn't Lucifer have all of God's powers, and God have all of Lucifer's?"

"The argument," Minerva agreed, "is that whether we're angels or demons is our own choice. It's not about the power, it's about what you do with it. We've been chosen and blessed with unique powers. That's why we can both kill, and Heal." She nodded to Madam Pomfrey, who smiled. "But Muggles grew to fear us, so we separated ourselves from their society."

I nodded thoughtfully. Then looked down at the envelope and slowly, carefully, slit the seal open. Two pieces of parchment fell out. I picked up the first. The first two lines were:

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore (Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorcerer, Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confederation of Wizards)

"Merlin was a real person?" I asked, puzzled.

"So was Morgana. Merlin defended Muggles while Morgana was a Dark and violent witch. They lived in medieval times," said Minerva. "That's where the stories come from. Powerful, famous witch and wizard names are used as epithets in our world. 'Merlin!' is a very popular exclamation."

"And this Dumbledore person… he looks really important."

"Yes. In addition to leading the movement against Voldemort, being headmaster of Hogwarts, and having been assigned several titles, Dumbledore also personally defeated the Dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, he has made several magical advancements and discoveries, and he has a place on the Wizengamot, wizarding Britain's high court of law."

"He must be very old," I commented. "It's hard to imagine anyone accomplishing that much in one lifetime."

"He is very old, and a genius," said Minerva. "He's also somewhat… eccentric. You'll understand what I mean when you meet him."

"He's the one who left me with the Dursleys for blood protection?" I confirmed.

"Yes. In his defense, Harry, you have to understand, most of Voldemort's - or You Know Who's - army wanted you found and murdered in the aftermath of his defeat."

I nodded. Looked at the rest of the letter.

Dear Mr Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.

Yours Sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress.

It was signed at the bottom. I looked up to find Minerva and Poppy watching me in suspense and excitement.

"So, Harry," said Minerva with false calm, "do you accept?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Really?" I said flatly.

"I must have an affirmative answer, Mr Potter."

I sighed with great drama. "Yes, I accept," I said, and smiled reluctantly when Poppy began cheering. I took the letter and tucked it safely into a drawer for safekeeping. I intended to hold onto it - my first Hogwarts letter - for sentimental reasons.

And as proof. Proof I made it. Proof I was worthy of the wizarding world.

I took up the supplies list and said, "So. Do we go shopping?"

"Yes," said Minerva briskly, recovering.

Poppy nodded to her. "I assume you'll take it from here, Minerva."

"Yes, thank you, Poppy." Minerva gave a small nod. Poppy disappeared with a little pop.

Minerva reached out her arm. "Take my hand," she said. "You can't Apparate yourself yet, not until you're sixteen - a year before you come of age in our world - but I'll give you a taste of it with Side-Along Apparition. Hold tight to me."

I took firm hold of her arm, clutching my supplies list. She turned, and I held on tighter, struggling to turn with her - And then all of a sudden it was like I was being sucked down a very long, tight, narrow tube. My body contracted, my eyes were being pushed back into my skull, and just when I thought I couldn't take anymore, we hit open air, my feet hit the ground, and I gasped for breath, my eyes watering.

"You're doing remarkably well," Minerva commented, as I doubled over, breathing heavily. "Most people vomit the first time they Side-Along Apparate. Then the first time they Apparate they usually splinch themselves - leave parts of their body behind."

"Comforting," I commented, picturing a leg and a pair of eyeballs lying with no owner in the middle of the street.

"Come with me," she said, and I looked up to find we were in a dark, dim, shabby little pub. Smoke drifted over the heads of the crowd, a low buzz of chatter filling the pub. There were some people who looked like magical creatures - one had to be a vampire, with his pale, bloodless face and the dark circles under his eyes, his crimson red drink - but most people were dressed in robes and Victorian era wear - pocket watches and waistcoats, top hats and corsets, handkerchiefs, big decorated women's hats. A couple of people were smoking pipes, all were clutching drinks.

I followed Minerva to the window and looked out over a completely ordinary Muggle street.

"We're in London," said Minerva. "Charing Cross Road."

People passed by, and their eyes slid right over the pub, from the bookshop on one side to the record shop on the other. The Notice Me Not charm was fully in place. I looked at the sign over the pub. "The Leaky Cauldron," it said. I looked back into the pub and saw a staircase leading to what had to be a cheap set of rooms.

"Now," Minerva whispered, "no one knows what you look like, and I never frequent bars and pubs, so let's see if we can get you through without your scar being spotted. The last thing we need today is a celebrity mob."

Celebrity. The idea was a little absurd.

I pulled my bangs over my scar self consciously, and we rushed through the pub and out the back door, to a small walled red-brick courtyard, without anyone noticing. "Was that one man really a vampire?" I questioned.

"Sharp eye," said Minerva wryly, taking out her wand. "Yes, we have all manner of magical creatures - dragons, vampires, hags, trolls, unicorns, centaurs, phoenixes, and everything in between. We have elves, and goblins are the ones who run the bank we will be visiting today."

"How does nobody ever notice a great dragon flying over a mountain or something?" I wondered.

"They do," said Minerva simply. "It's the Ministry's job to find those people and use memory erasure charms. Then there is a whole separate section of the Ministry for erasing the memories of people who, accidentally or on purpose, come upon some sort of dangerous or cursed magical object - it's a nasty business.

"Now. The biggest London shopping center is called The Alleys. To get to it, you count bricks in the wall above the trash can." She pointed at an innocuous trash can set against the wall, and then counted from the direct center brick in the wall above the trash can. "Three up and two across," she said. "This is the brick." She pointed.

"So what would happen if somebody moved the trash can?" I wondered.

"That trash can hasn't been moved in over a hundred years."

"Now I kind of want to move it."

"Mr Potter, don't move the trash can."

"Come on, it would be funny."

"Mr Potter, if you move that trash can, we cannot go shopping in the Alleys."

"Well, yeah. Because we won't know which brick is the right one."

Minerva and I stared at each other for a moment. "Do you know, Harry," said Minerva at last, "I am beginning to revise my opinion that you are nothing like your father."

I grinned. "Okay, fine," I said. "I never get to have any fun."

Minerva sighed, rolled her eyes, and tapped the correct brick with the tip of her wand. The brick she had touched quivered, moved aside, all the bricks around it moved aside, the hole got bigger and bigger - and soon enough we were facing a huge archway that led to a twisting cobblestone street lined with colorful little shop buildings, each one unique.

"Welcome, Harry," said Minerva, "to Diagon Alley."

I stepped slowly through in amazement - looked behind myself and Minerva - saw the archway shrink instantly back into solid wall.

"Now," said Minerva, and I looked forward again. "To our right is Knockturn. It is a haven for thievery and all manner of Dark magic and you certainly will not be going there with me today." She pointed at a hidden passageway to our right. I looked after Knockturn curiously. "But the rest of the Alleys are fairly safe. To our left is Seletschi and then Oxsipit." There was another hidden passageway to our left. All the different Alleys must interconnect with each other.

"First," said Minerva, "we go to the bank. I have business to take care of there for Dumbledore, and we must get the money to buy your school supplies. Now." She turned to me. "There is something I didn't feel safe saying in your relatives' house. Your parents did leave you money."

"Thank you for not saying that within their earshot," I said fervently. "They'd have had it from me faster than blinking."

"I suspected as much. I doubt they as Muggles could have laid hold of your ancient Potter funds, but it's best not to risk it."

"Ancient?"

"Yes. You see, until your father married your mother, the Potters were an ages-old Pureblood family. Very rich, too. You have an ancestor in the twelfth century who invented and bought the rights to several commonly used medicinal potions, including Pepper-Up and Skele-Grow. It's like the Muggle equivalent of getting money every time a Tylenol bottle is sold." My eyes widened. "Yes, exactly," said Minerva briskly. "He was always pottering around in his garden. Hence, 'Potter.' Your mother was quite a good potion-brewer as well, so Potions runs in your blood. It's also closest to cooking, and as it's a physical sensory-based exercise, with a bit of hard work you should be a natural."

"So I have… how much money?"

"All I know is that you have the main Potter family account, which you can't access until seventeen, and then a trust fund your parents set up for you that is replenished every time your money runs out," said Minerva. "But let's go to Gringotts Bank and get a full statement of all your accounts and assets from the goblins."

We walked along Diagon. I turned my head in every which way as we walked down the street, trying to take in everything at once. Cauldrons in one shop window, dragon meat being sold at the Apothecary, boys gathered around a racing broom in another shop window. There were shops selling decorated robes and Victorian era fashion and cloaks and Wiccan symbols. There was a whole shop for technomagic. There was a tattoo parlor. There were barrels of bat spleens and eels eyes for potion brewing, globes of the moon, whirring silver instruments advertised as ward detectors, shops full of messenger owls and magical creatures, shops selling quills and parchment and ink, book shops, music shops selling records and radios with old-fashioned instruments in the window…

It was all so absurd, so wonderful, so incredible. The cobblestone streets and old-fashioned lamp posts, the colorful shops and even more colorful robes and pointed hats.

In a strange way, I felt at home, wonderfully at home and happy, for the first time. I felt like I belonged somewhere. I'd never had that experience before.

I think that was the moment when I truly fell in love with the wizarding world. My entire life after that was one great mission to protect it.

We found a white marble building with Grecian pillars that towered over the other little shops. Standing guard at the doors in a red and gold uniform, holding a pike, was a small, brown-skinned creature with a wicked, clever, pointed face and very long fingers and feet.

Minerva paused me. "A word about goblins," she said. "They are miners, and fine jewel and metal workers. They run Gringotts Bank which stretches all the way across Europe and Africa. They bring you to your vaults because they like to brag about the fact that the money's always there. They are wicked clever creatures, forming themselves an unusually high place in wizarding society for a non-human. They can also be quite vicious and underhanded, especially to a wizard. They have tried to uprise several times, and nearly succeeded at least twice.

"My point is, it is best to keep a quiet, respectful distance from them."

We walked up the stone steps, and the goblin bowed us through a pair of bronze doors. We were now facing a second pair of doors, silver this time, with words engraved upon them:

Enter, stranger, but take heed

Of what awaits the sin of greed.

For those who take, but do not earn

Must pay most dearly in their turn.

So if you seek beneath our floors

A treasure that was never yours,

Thief, you have been warned, beware

Of finding more than treasure there.

"Gringotts vaults are as heavily guarded as Hogwarts School," said Minerva seriously. "They are in a kind of deep underground maze, heavily guarded by magical enchantments. Rumors say there are dragons guarding the high-security vaults."

We walked through the bronze doors and found ourselves in a vast marble hall. A long counter cut the hall in half, with goblins sitting behind it. Some were writing in account books, others were weighing precious stones or examining them through eyeglasses.

"I see no humans," I said, frowning, confused.

"Human bankers focus on the magic around the vaults," said Minerva simply. "The goblins keep all the money-counting for themselves."

We walked up to a free goblin. "Mr Harry Potter would like to make a withdrawal from his trust fund," said Minerva crisply, and several curious heads turned in our direction. I looked down. "I also have a letter here from Professor Dumbledore about vault 713."

She handed the goblin a golden key. "Confirmed as the Potter key," said the goblin after examining it for a moment, and the golden key was handed down the long counter to me for safekeeping. The goblin then read the letter from Dumbledore.

"I will have someone take you down to both vaults," said the goblin. "Griphook!" A goblin came forward obligingly and led us silently toward one of the many doors leading off the hall that people were being shown into and out of.

"What's in vault 713?" I asked.

"I cannot tell you, and do not ask about it again," said Minerva firmly. "It is private Hogwarts business."

I fell silent.

We entered a narrow stone passageway lit with flaming torches. It sloped steeply downward and there were little railway tracks on the floor. Griphook whistled and a mining cart hurtled up the tracks toward us. We all climbed in, and zoomed off downward through cold air and into a maze of twisting passageways. We passed by countless metal vault doors, once a burst of fire - I twisted around to catch it, but we had already moved on - and past an underground lake full of stalactites and stalagmites, and finally we arrived at a metal vault door.

"Vault 687," said Griphook. "Mr Harry Potter's trust fund."

Griphook used the golden key to unlock the door and green smoke came billowing out as the door opened. "What's that?" I asked, pointing.

"Toxic fumes," said Griphook pleasantly. "Only harmless to those who belong."

Inside was an unreal amount of money. Piles, columns, mounds of gold, silver, and bronze coins. I stared, gaping openly. And this was only the trust fund - and it replenished itself regularly. Me, who had never had pocket money or a real gift in my life, me, who grew up in a cobweb ridden cupboard, me, who wore ragged grey secondhand clothes…

I was rich.

Professor McGonagall helped me pile some of it into a drawstring purse bag. "The gold coins are Galleons," she said. "Seventeen silver Sickles to a Galleon and twenty-nine bronze Knuts to a Sickle."

After getting my money, we got back into the cart and zoomed down further underground, into colder and colder air, hurtling around tight corners… We rattled over an underground ravine; I leaned over but could make out nothing in the dark bottom.

At last, we arrived at a metal vault door, 713.

"Stand back," said Griphook importantly. He stroked the door with one of his long fingers and it simply melted away. "If anyone but a Gringotts goblin tried that, they'd be sucked through the door and trapped in there," said Griphook.

"How often do you check to see if anyone's inside?" I asked.

"About once every ten years," said Griphook with a rather nasty grin.

There was nothing in this vault except a grubby little package wrapped in brown paper lying on the floor. Minerva, who was wearing emerald green robes today, picked up the package and tucked it deep inside a pocket of her cloak.

I longed to know what was in the package, but knew better than to ask. She wouldn't tell me, I was sure of that. Hogwarts business, she had said.

"Now," said Minerva, "let's go get a full statement of all your accounts and assets."

* * *

We ended up in a private office at Gringotts, sitting across from Griphook at a desk. He showed me a long scroll of parchment full of figures, and my eyes widened.

"This is your trust fund. It just replenished itself because you took money out. That's the current figure. There's the Potter family account - as you can see, the figure is much bigger. It replenishes itself several times a day. So many people buy Pepper-up Potions each day for the common cold that it's only set to refill itself at certain intervals and certain times of day. Cold season is your biggest part of the year.

"That's Potter Manor, which you completely own. It was built in the 1100's, and so was paid off long ago. Once you reach majority, you may move into it if you so choose. That figure is how much it's currently worth. Enough to live your entire life off of if you ever decide to sell it."

Here, Griphook gave a rather wicked grin.

"You also currently own the Black family account. Your godfather, a Black, and his successor, another Black, are both in Azkaban prison, and you were next on the list of possible recipients. If you wish to take complete control of it at this point, you could do so and add the Black money to your other accounts."

"I so choose," I said immediately.

"Very well, we will update our record to reflect as such. Please sign this form." I signed my name on the parchment form with quill and ink, with some difficulty, and the Black family figure appeared on my sheet. I didn't think my eyes could have gotten any wider, but they did then.

"You are now sole proprietor and heir of both Potter and Black. As you can see, the Blacks were a quite ancient and very rich family as well. You now also own Grimmauld Place, the Black family manor, which as you can see is worth quite a bit of money as well.

"Here is their vault key." He handed over a vast, ancient, silver key. "The Black money will be added in equal amount of the Potter money to your trust fund, enlarging it further."

I nodded. "If I might ask… why are the Blacks in prison?" I asked curiously. "You said one was my godfather?"

Minerva and Griphook gave each other a serious look.

"The Black woman was a supporter of You Know Who, Harry," said Minerva gently. "The Black man, your godfather, pretended to be friends with your parents but was really a spy for You Know Who. He's the one who ratted out their hidden location. The Blacks are a very old Dark Pureblood wizarding family."

Unseen rage filled me. "Then I'm glad I took all his money," I said darkly. "Maybe I'll donate some of the Black money toward a charity for Muggleborns, just to piss them off."

* * *

We changed some of my wizarding money into Muggle money at the front counter - just in case - and then left Gringotts, my pockets jingling with wizard's gold, and turned onto Selestchi. "It's time to update your look to reflect your new status," said Minerva determinedly, and I couldn't agree more. What kind of self respecting rich heir walked around in baggy old second-hand clothes?

We ended up in front of a vast, gleaming department store called Gladrags, and walked inside to find it had a section for everything, it seemed. Black department signs with scribbled gold writing re-wrote themselves occasionally, and pictures of models on the walls smiled seductively and posed, moving about, each supernaturally beautiful.

We paid to hire a lovely purple-robed to witch to give us a personal tour through each section of Gladrags. "Oh, yes, you do need our help," she said sympathetically, looking me over, and then she whisked me off through each section of Gladrags. I was cut, polished, pruned, dressed, bedazzled, and every other verb you could possibly think of, pushed this way and that, the mirrors themselves charmed to speak and give catty comments and fashion advice - telling me occasionally how well my look was shaping up - while countless purple robed men and women chattered along as they gave me a complete makeover.

I was pulled in, still surprised, looking slovenly, and I was pushed out the other end looking, to use a Muggle term, "like a million bucks," but with very little idea as to how it had happened.

The shopping part was fun, though. I did get to choose what kind of clothing and jewelry I wore, and the spa treatment I got in one section was supremely relaxing. I was taught a lot about what it took to look good, and found a kind of ISFP satisfaction in choosing the right patterns and shades, getting the robes tucked and tapered just right, getting my hands and feet softened and my nails done.

We got me new Muggle clothes, new casual wear robes, and a specially tucked and tapered black Hogwarts school uniform. I also bought a new haircut, contacts to replace my glasses, and jewelry.

My haircut was a messy, short on the sides with more volume on top kind of hairstyle, the contacts not obscuring my face and showing off my eyes more. I wore slim fit designer clothes in Winter complexion shades - for my robes, including black uniform robes, the bottom and the sleeves flared out while the rest of it was slim fit. I bought lots of silver and glittery jewelry - rings, pendants, wrist bracelets. I loved the spa treament for my hands and feet, even buying warm vanilla sugar scented body wash and hand lotion, and I found I genuinely enjoyed shopping for new color shades and styles.

It was okay for a boy to be feminine in the wizarding world, in a way it really wasn't for the Muggle world equivalent. No one looked twice if I bought hot pink clothes or scented hand lotion; no one derogatorily called me a "fag," and I remembered that even if they had called me gay, it wouldn't have been intended as an insult.

I got dressed in a fresh set of casual wear robes and some jewelry, checking myself out in the mirror. It was amazing how much difference that made. I looked… good. More than that, I looked rich.

"The uniform tie and the black Hogwarts robes will be decorated with your house colors and emblem, once you're Sorted," Minerva told me. "Why the choice in scents, if I might ask?"

"Their scents go by season, and it was my favorite Winter scent." I smiled.

"You like winter?"

"Yeah. Christmas is great and snow is fun. Hey," I said in surprise. "That's another thing I like."

I was eating up self-knowledge like it was candy.

Next we went and bought me technomagic. Minerva helped me buy a radio connected to the WWN (wizarding wireless network, which worked anywhere on technomagic in Britain, free of charge and government funded), along with a laptop, cell phone, and mp3 player that did the same. All top of the line.

Next we stopped by the Daily Prophet headquarters - that was the biggest wizarding Britain newspaper - and bought me a subscription. It was filled with typewriters and the smell of ink, reporters working away at desks by dictating to their quills and having the quills write themselves. Hundreds of mail owls fluttered, blinking jewel-like eyes, around the walls, waiting to send out daily and evening papers to all their subscribers. "That technology and this newspaper subscription should help you keep in contact with our world from the safety of your bedroom on Privet Drive," said McGonagall, "especially with that lock you placed on your bedroom door. And the subscription doesn't cost very much per owl trip."

I was watching the latest edition on a nearby stand, which had smiling and waving black and white subjects in all the photos.

Next, we went on one of Poppy's recommendations. She'd noticed in our sessions that I sometimes had trouble sleeping, and so on her advice we bought me a crystal salt lamp and several ASMR audios meant to soothe a person to sleep without the use of medicinal potions from the Apothecary.

We stopped by the bookstore next, Flourish and Blotts, which had books as large as paving stones bound in leather, books the size of postage stamps covered in silk, books with strange symbols filling them, and a few books with nothing in them at all. I had countless questions for Professor McGonagall from the moment we walked inside, and she told me that the tiny silk books were for fairies, the strange symbols books were full of Ancient Runes, and the empty books either used invisible ink or you had to be something magical in particular to read them.

She helped me buy several books on advanced magic I could not do yet - I was curious to learn everything I could get my hands on, and she did not quell my natural curiosity - and some supplemental reading on the wizarding world. She also bought me some wizarding music and fiction. The Hobgoblins were a long-haired classic rock wizarding group from the 70's and 80's; Lorcan D'Eath had a soft, dark sort of charm to him - he was a handsome half vampire. And I was fascinated by wizarding fairy tales, mainly the love stories featuring characters falling in love with monsters and helping them overcome their darker sides.

Then we bought my textbooks, which looked interesting enough - everything from spell books to herb and potion books to books of wizarding history and magical theory were included.

I resolved to read it all before arriving at Hogwarts. I wanted to be ready to go from the moment I set my foot in the door.

We then bought other miscellaneous - a scroll notes organizer, a book on how to write with a quill, several different colors of ink (on my request), astronomy models and star charts, parchment and eagle feather quills, a magnificent bronze collapsible cauldron, a collapsible telescope, bronze scales.

We bought Potions supplies and dragonhide protective gloves at the Apothecary - I bought the tough black expensive Hungarian Horntail dragon hide gloves, and the crystal instead of glass vials. The Apothecary was fascinating, though it smelled horrible, and I walked around examining the different herbal animal and plant parts on display, each ingredient used in different combination with others to create a whole wide variety of potions. I bought a supplementary potions book from the Apothecary, full of little cheats and tricks; it was a subject I was determined to do well in.

Minerva then sighed and said, "I would be in remiss if I didn't introduce you to wizarding sweets."

So she bought me candy and pumpkin juice from a vendor on Oxsipit, explaining to me what each wizarding sweet entailed. The wizarding world had it all, it seemed - from sherbet balls that made you float to never-melting ice cream to candy that made your teeth chatter to chocolate in all manner of wizarding shapes complete with famous witch and wizard trading cards. The jelly beans were huge mixed bags full of hundreds of flavors. The bluebell colored bubblegum could last for days. There was blood flavored candy for vampires and something called cockroach clusters. There were pumpkin pasties and licorice wands and cauldron cakes and quills and snowflakes that melted on your tongue made entirely of sugar. The wizard crackers carried such treats as live mice and party hats, and went off with loud bangs and blue puffs of smoke.

It seemed the delights would never end.

Minerva watched wryly as I got all hopped up on sugar, then she took me sightseeing, past theaters and Wiccan religious houses and little parlors and flats set directly in the Alleys - all the architecture wonderfully old-fashioned, some of it red-brick. Even something as mundane as the grocer's seemed beautiful in my admiring eyes.

We eventually wandered back to Diagon to get two things: the single pet I was allowed at Hogwarts, and my wand.

Inspired by my friendship with Minerva - and knowing I could just message other wizards using technomagic if I really wanted to - I decided to get a cat. We went to the Magical Menagerie, which had everything from jewel-encrusted tortoises to gigantic orange frogs to rats skipping jump-rope, everything rustling and making a loud racket along the walls, and asked for a pet cat.

I was set to a long wall full of cats and walked along, being allowed to choose. I paused, at last, on an elegant looking female Siamese cat. She was not purring or trying to show off for me, as the other cats were, but rather eyeing me up and down, as if to see if I was worthy of her. I reached out to pet her, my hand pausing, and after a moment she let me.

"This one," I said, turning back and smiling.

The clerk at the Magical Menagerie smiled back. "Once a cat has chosen you, they really are yours," she said.

I brought my female Siamese cat out in a carrying case.

And, at last, the part I had been looking forward to most - we went to the wand shop. My first step to having the kind of power that McGonagall had.

The wand shop was narrow and shabby. Peeling gold letters over the door read: Ollivanders - Makers of Fine Wands Since 382 BC.

"Their family came here in Roman times," said Minerva, noticing where I was looking.

A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty window. Apparently, Ollivander didn't need much advertising.

We walked inside with a tinkling bell, and found a small desk behind which thousands of long, narrow wand boxes were stacked neatly right up to the ceiling. There was a dusty sort of library silence in the space, a magic sort of tingle in the dust mote ridden air.

"Magic," I whispered, my green eyes wide. "I can feel it." Minerva looked down at me sharply.

"Good afternoon."

I whirled around. A tiny old man with wispy white hair and wide, pale eyes like moons was standing there. He stared unblinkingly into mine.

"Ollivander," Minerva greeted.

"Minerva. Fir and dragon heartstring, wasn't it?"

"It was, yes."

"You remember every wand you've ever sold? How?" I was curious.

"Mind magic, Mr Potter. It can be used to read minds, and to block minds from entry, but it can also give a talented witch or wizard supernatural powers - the ability to learn hundreds of languages, for example. Or, in my case, to remember every wand I've ever sold. And to look into the minds of my customers and fit them with their perfect wand."

"Wands are sold based on personality?"

"Oh, yes. And the wand chooses the wizard - the wizard never chooses the wand."

"So how do you make wands?" I asked. "What are they made of?"

"There are four qualities. Length, consistency, type of wood, and whether the core is a unicorn hair, a phoenix feather, or the heartstring of a dragon. My, you certainly do have a lot of questions," said Mr Ollivander, looking me over. Then he smiled. "Your mother did, too. Lily Evans. Wonderful girl. Wand made of willow, excellent for Healing and charm-work."

"Charms being the ability to change the properties of people or items," I confirmed. "But, sir, isn't potions a kind of magic, too? Wasn't she good at that as well?"

Mr Ollivander chuckled and turned disbelievingly to Minerva. "He's always like this, Mr Ollivander," Minerva confirmed dryly.

"Very well, Mr Potter, let's set you up with your perfect wand," said Mr Ollivander. He gave me a great deal of measurements with a measuring tape, asked me my birthday ("July thirty-first"), and then left the measuring tape floating in the air beside me and flittered around the shelves with his long ladder, taking down wand boxes.

Here is how it would go: He would hand me a wand, I would wave it, and absolutely nothing would happen. He would then hand me another wand so I could try that one instead. And, again, absolutely nothing would happen.

This went on for a good fifteen or twenty minutes, and I was beginning to get anxious that I was unworthy of a wand, even though I knew that was just my past with the Dursleys talking. At last, Mr Ollivander paused and said, "I wonder…"

He went into the back of the shop, taking out a very old and very dusty wand box. He brought it out to me, opened it up, handed me the wand. He gave me the properties, just as he had all the others.

"Beech wood and phoenix feather, ten inches, brittle…"

I took the wand and felt a warmth in my fingers. I lifted it up over my head, and I didn't feel stupid as I had waving all the other wands. I brought the wand swishing down through the dusty air, cutting through the thickness with a series of sparks that threw dancing spots of light on the walls.

Minerva began applauding and Mr Ollivander cried, "Very good, very good! How curious…" he added in a murmur, as if to himself. "How very curious…"

"What's wrong?" I asked, frowning, clutching my wand - already defensive of it.

"Nothing's wrong, Mr Potter, but your wand is quite peculiar.

"First, it is a very choosy wand indeed, yet capable of an enormous range of magic. Second, beech wood is a very handsome wood, much sought after and greatly reputed for its great power, its subtlety and artistry, a subtlety and artistry that is not repeated in any other type of wand wood unless that wood solely deals in subtlety and artistry. Phoenix feather and beech wood is a rare and deadly combination.

"Second, this particular phoenix only ever gave me two feathers. One feather is in your wand. The other feather… is in the wand of He Who Must Not Be Named."

I felt cold for a moment.

"Yes. His was yew, thirteen and a half inches, but the core is the same. Curious indeed how these things happened. I think we must expect great things from you, Mr Potter. After all, He Who Must Not Be Named did great things. Terrible, yes… but great."

I stared down at the wand.

"But greatness," Minerva reminded me softly, "does not have to be evil."

"Quite right, Minerva!" said Mr Ollivander. "In fact, beech wood only ever chooses the wise and the tolerant. I always thought it quite curious, that the great Lord's wand match only ever chooses those who are open minded and accepting of all peoples."

I smiled. It was like Parseltongue, then. It didn't mean I was evil, only powerful.

I paid for my wand and Mr Ollivander bowed us from his shop.

Carrying my wrapped wand box, all my other goods floating before us, I asked Minerva, "What now?"

"Now," she said, "we Apparate all your things back to your room and get you set up. I think we have quite enough, don't you?"

I smiled wryly, and reluctantly, I reached out for her arm. Apparition was something I would have to get used to, I supposed - but I didn't necessarily like it.

Hopefully, the bus I would start taking would make for a somewhat easier ride.


	7. Chapter 7

7.

Poppy and Minerva introduced me to the Daze Bus and the Knight Bus, the two wizarding Britain bus routes. In both cases, a witch or wizard with a working wand put out their wand arm, and with a bang a violently purple triple-decker bus appeared, one on which you could get a table and coffee and lunch during the day, and a bed and hot cocoa and a toothbrush at night. There were no seats; the bus was literally three rows of beds or lunch tables (depending on time of day) with windowed curtains.

I always chose the top deck, both because I loved the feel of it as the bus sped along and because there was less chance of someone spotting my scar up there. The bus would start and stop with sudden bangs, whizzing along through different sections of the country at alarmingly high speeds, occasionally teleporting to a different area of the country randomly. None of the bus drivers seemed to have mastered the use of a steering wheel, but it didn't matter - the bus could squeeze in the tiniest spaces between cars, no Muggles ever noticed the bus, and when the bus jumped onto the pavement lamp posts and trash cans all dodged out of its way, and then back into place once it had passed.

The bus cost money to board, but I had that in spades and it was worth it to me, to be able to travel to London and the Alleys and back in the space of a day anytime I wanted. I began going on my own to check out the other Alleys in more detail freely.

I did explore Knockturn once or twice, because come on, wouldn't you be curious? It was a smoky little dark lantern-lit alleyway full of equally dark, forbidding shop buildings and shabby, sketchy-looking people in torn robes. Someone tried to pick my pocket once; another time an old woman offered me a plate of what looked horribly like human fingernails. I politely declined her and decided not to look too closely at the plate. Those were fingernails, and that was gross.

But for the most part, Knockturn was very interesting. The shopkeepers were trying to make a living just like everybody else, so as long as I kept my bangs over my scar I got plenty of very interesting tours. Knockturn shops sold things like large live spiders eating each other in cages, poisons, human bones, ancient weapons, handy tools for thieves, and cursed objects. There were lots of neat little antiques stores there, but it was wise not to touch anything too pretty until you asked what it was in Knockturn for first.

I was used to wandering and taking the bus around even the dingier parts of Surrey just to get away from home growing up as a child, so I took all this more calmly than most children might have. As long as you kept one hand on your purse, the other hand on your wand, and a sharp and cautious eye, Knockturn was an interesting place. I did buy a thing or two to appease shopkeepers who led me on tours, little non-cursed antique trinkets with a promise to buy more when I came back. (I rarely did.) Mostly I was there for the experience, though I was careful never to tell anyone else this.

But I spent the main part of my time in the other Alleys. And then, of course, at home, I paid an owl for the Daily Prophet every morning, learning things like who the current Minister for Magic was (Cornelius Fudge) and who the biggest gossip columnist was (Rita Skeeter; she seemed to write an article at least once a week about either The Weird Sisters, an all-male rock group, or Celestina Warbeck, a popular singer). I kept my radio on while working on this or that, tuning in to Quidditch games and news updates and slowly learning the ins and outs of wizarding lingo, and in my spare time I played my new wizarding music. I downloaded all of my favorites onto my technology, connecting to the WWN and finding wizarding social networking sites.

I felt connected to the wizarding world in a way I never really had before.

I continued with therapy, but I also dove into my studies in preparation for Hogwarts. It seemed I was always either reading something, or practicing a new potion or a spell. I also practiced wandless magic - and sensing out my own magic helped me greatly with wand based magic; after that it was all just a matter of practicing physical technique - and I read studies Minerva had recommended of Parseltongue.

Between all of this and my new hobbies (music, drawing, cooking), I was kept quite busy, though I did have time to name my new pet Siamese cat Jada. I had a piece of paper pinned to the wall, counting down the days till September the first.

Minerva and Poppy helped me celebrate my eleventh birthday on July 31. They brought me a chocolate cake and sang me Happy Birthday, took me to the aquarium, and then the three of us took the bus to the nearest flying practice field, which was hidden behind something that looked to Muggles like an elementary school but which was upon closer inspection found to be abandoned.

There was an instructor to teach me my first flying lesson out on the grassy green field, but I didn't need much instruction. The broom jumped into my hand on the first try, I leaped onto it, and ten minutes later I was flying every which way about the Quidditch field, fast and graceful, like I'd been doing it for a decade. Minerva, Poppy, and my supposed instructor watched me, amused and mystified.

"This is amazing!" I kept shouting. "It's so easy!"

And it was. Somehow, I just magically knew what to do. It was instinctive, it was easy, it was wonderful. Quidditch was suddenly demystified for me as a passion.

First years weren't allowed brooms - we learned flying on the school brooms first - but I promised myself that the minute I was allowed one I was buying a top of the line racing broom. That looping, fast, flying sensation - there was nothing like it.

I shouted and laughed, looping and flying around the flying field. For once, I was having the time of my life on my birthday.

And for the first time, I felt connected to my Dad.


	8. Chapter 8

8.

I put the newspaper down. The news itself was interesting - someone had broken into Gringotts vault 713, which of course had already been found to be emptied. More than that, they'd gotten back out without being caught, which was sort of supposed to be impossible.

But I was distracted. There was something I'd been thinking about a lot lately.

I'd already checked the bylaws, and since I had no legal wizarding guardian, I could change my name anytime I wanted to. And I did want to. I had an idea of changing my name in reflection of the new person I'd become.

Yet I had mixed feelings about getting rid of the name my parents had given me.

But I associated the name Harry James with that tragic orphan abuse victim who didn't know himself. And that wasn't me anymore.

At last, I texted Poppy and Minerva. "I want to change my name," the text said simply.

* * *

I looked through countless books, comparing and weighing different names. At last, deciding I liked music, and I also liked Christmas and winter, I chose my new name: Quintus Noel. Quintus Noel Potter.

As I sat down across from the legal expert in my bedroom, the piece of parchment to sign to change my name before me, Minerva spoke. She and Poppy were standing worriedly on either side.

"You know, Harry, that once you do this the wizarding world will positively explode," she said, reserved.

I signed my name and sat back.

"Let the exploding begin," I said. "And it's Quintus now."

I looked up at her and smirked.

* * *

I don't know who leaked it, but soon it was all over the newspapers:

Harry Potter Changes Name!

Harry Potter is Now Quintus Noel!

Harry Potter Re-Enters Wizarding World with a Splash!

Minerva got me a press agent, a neat and dapper man with slicked back brown hair named Mr Mason, who advised me in concern: "You're going to have to do an interview, and it's going to have to be with Rita Skeeter. I would advise you to give her something honest but juicy - something to sink her teeth into that won't hurt you too much. Otherwise, just smile for the cameras; you're a charming little kid. They'll do the rest."

So I sat down across from Rita Skeeter in the Daily Prophet office in the Alleys. Her acid green quill spun across the page as she spoke to me. She had blonde curls, a heavily jawed face, jeweled spectacles, long crimson nails, and penciled-on eyebrows.

I disliked her on sight, but revealing that would do me no good.

"So, Harry - or it's Quintus now, isn't it? Rebelling against your saintly parents? Feeling a little… er… parental pressure?" She smirked at me and I could see the quill already scribbling away.

"I feel family pressure, but not in that area," I said, smiling slightly. Rita paused, and so did her acid green quill. "I do not have a particularly good relationship with the relatives who raised me, and my old name reminds me of - well - of them. Of growing up under their control. I've decided to free myself from that. That's what the new name means."

I'd practiced this speech several times, right down to the pause and the "well." It was working. Rita's pen was rewriting.

"Your relatives are controlling, Quintus? You don't like them very much?"

"They don't like me. They're not… particularly fond of magic." Understatement of the century.

"They're magic-prejudiced! The great Boy Who Lived was raised by magic hating Muggles! So do you have anything you'd like to say to Albus Dumbledore, who I know placed you with your relatives?"

"I decline to comment," I said reservedly, another thing Mr Mason had advised me about.

It didn't matter. Rita Skeeter's eyes were gleaming. She had her story.

After that, I just talked about my excitement to go to Hogwarts and my ambition to be "someone great, in spite of my relatives," and I had her.

We took a picture at her Daily Prophet desk. I gave a small smile, my new look on full display, casual wear robes and pendant and all.

The picture was splashed all over newspapers and magazines, all across the Internet, with emblazoned captions like, Boy Who Lived Hates Muggle Family! And, Boy Who Lived Was Raised by Magic Haters! One said: Boy Who Lived Hates His Family - And We Totally Understand.

Of course, many people threw poison on the image of Albus Dumbledore, but my declining to comment just made me look more polite in this new, sympathetic light. And in any case, he'd defeated a Dark wizard; his image could survive the fall.

Soon, everyone was either commenting on how cute I was, or commenting on how Rita chose to describe me. She decided to go with an easygoing feel, how I'd agreed to simply meet her at her reporter's desk in Diagon, had brought a coffee, was quiet and polite and nicely dressed.

I became the boy from a dark family who was determined to be a great wizard anyway. That was the image I had chosen to go for - with much counseling from Minerva, Poppy, and Mr Mason.

It was even true.

* * *

Poppy gave me one thorough physical before I was due to go to Hogwarts, just to be sure nothing could be found lacking in the first. She'd been giving me supplemental potions for a couple of months, to fill out my scrawny figure, and she said, pleased, "They seem to be working perfectly. You're wonderfully healthy!"

"Now, here is your ticket onto the Hogwarts Express," said Minerva seriously, handing me an envelope with a ticket inside. "It leaves from Kings Cross Station in London at 11 AM on September first. It waits for no one, so don't be late. Have your trunk and cat carrier ready, but you can change into your school robes on the train. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, both of you. I'll see you at Hogwarts." I looked up at them solemnly.

They smiled. "See you at Hogwarts, Quintus."

* * *

I went downstairs to my family on the afternoon of August thirty-first.

"I've changed my name," I said quietly on the staircase. "It's now Quintus Noel Potter."

They stared up at me, caught off guard, from the living room.

"I know you haven't approved it," I said, robotic, emotionless. "You didn't need to.

"I leave early tomorrow morning to go to Hogwarts. Goodbye."

I turned to go back up the stairs. It looked almost for a moment as if they were going to say something, but they never did. We missed each other.

It was a good metaphor for our entire relationship, actually.


	9. Chapter 9

9.

I got up at 5 AM and was too excited and nervous to go back to sleep. Also, I planned on taking the bus to London, and since I knew a lot of people would be doing that I wanted to get an early start. I absolutely had to get to King's Cross on time.

I checked my trunk was all packed, checked that Jada was safely in her cat carrier, and then I locked my bedroom door for the school year, taking the key with me, and I levitated my things down the stairs and outside onto the front sidewalk in the dark and the quiet. I stuck out my wand arm, stepped back, and with a BAM the purple triple-decker bus appeared.

"Mr Potter!" said the conductor, delighted, when he saw me. The bus people had gotten very excited since recognizing who I was. The conductor helped me get all my things safely tucked away near a table. I looked around. It was so early hardly anyone was here; perfect.

The conductor chattered along excitedly to me all the way to King's Cross - I was mostly quiet, nodding and saying, "Mmm," here and there - and then helped me load my things onto a trolley at the station.

"Good luck with your first year, Mr Potter!" The conductor waved brightly, the doors shut, and with another BAM the bus disappeared.

I got breakfast at the station, sitting at a plastic seat to eat, and then I walked to the barrier between platforms nine and ten. McGonagall had told me before leaving the other day - the platform was 9 and ¾, and I would have to get there by walking straight through the solid wrought iron barrier between platforms nine and ten.

I walked toward the barrier, jostled here and there by passing people, leaned casually against the barrier - leaned right through it and stumbled, taking my trolley with me.

A scarlet steam engine, the Hogwarts Express, sat next to a platform filled with people both in robes and in Muggle clothes, hissing steam that floated over the heads of the crowd. Cats meowed and slunk between legs and owls hooted to one another over the babble and the scraping of heavy trunks. There were older students with black robes and silver Prefect badges in the first few compartments; next were younger students fighting over seats and hanging out of the windows to talk to families. Wizarding families appeared along the platform with a pop every few feet, holding their children's hands.

I found an empty compartment and levitated my things into it. Students and parents alike were openly pointing and staring at me as I passed, whispering to each other. I pretended not to notice.

I curled up in a corner of the compartment - perhaps intimidated, no one came to join me - and took out a book for the wait. At last, the whistle sounded, and the train began to move. I looked out the window, watching the platform fall away, countless parents waving. Then the train rounded a corner and they were gone. Houses flashed past the window.

I felt a great leap of excitement. I was on my way - I was on my way to Hogwarts and becoming a wizard.

There was a shriek out in the corridor and I went out to look. Crowds were shrieking and crying over a giant black tarantula crawling and doing tricks all over the arm of an older black boy with dreadlocks. The boy was grinning, unafraid.

"Move it, out of the way!"

First year boys pushed past me, racing each other to the other end of the train corridor. The whole scene had an aura of great excitement.

"Anything off the trolley, dears?" a smiling old lady was calling, pushing a cart full of sweets and pumpkin juice down the corridor. Students dropped coins onto her tray and grabbed sweets and juice. I bought some chocolate frogs and a bottle of ice cold pumpkin juice and took them back to my compartment. I closed the window curtains, changed into my black Hogwarts robes, and then settled down with my sweets, my juice, and my book. I let Jada my cat out to roam around the compartment, petting her absently occasionally, and I had my beech wood and phoenix feather wand tucked safely away in a robe pocket.

My first Chocolate Frog card today, appropriately enough, was Headmaster Dumbledore's. It talked about his defeat of the Dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, his discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's blood, and his work on alchemy with Nicolas Flamel. An old man with a long silver beard and half moon spectacles smiled up at me from the moving photograph. I wondered if Dumbledore resented me after that press stunt over the summer. I hoped not; it was nothing personal.

I turned back to my book, snacking as I went and watching the scenery change outside the window. We moved slowly as the day progressed from cities, to neat rural farm fields, to forests and twisting rivers and dark green hills. Night came on and the sky turned dark and purple, and still we hadn't arrived. Chain lamps in the train compartment corners magically lit themselves at night. I listened to the train puff on and tried to relax, not feel nervous.

I was broken, quite frequently, by people sliding open the compartment door to talk to me. Girls came in blushing and giggling, people came in wanting photographs and autographs, or wanting to talk to me or become my friend, or wanting to brag, or wanting to talk excitedly about a past that was obviously painful to me for anyone with half a brain. I smiled and tried to chat as much as I could - I'd never been much for idle talk - and I signed autographs and took pictures.

It was weird, being a celebrity. People kept wanting to shake my hand, emotional, and tell me how great I was. I didn't really feel like I'd done anything worthy of note at all. That wasn't even my self doubt talking, it was just… I'd been a baby. I didn't even remember doing anything.

Faces and names blurred past me and I was sure I hadn't remembered any of them. I felt a bit lonely, isolated - had ever since I'd seen parents sending off their children on the platform.

At last, the train began to slow down, and a silvery voice echoed magically through it: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minutes' time. Please leave your luggage on the train; it will be taken to the school separately." It was pitch black outside by now.

My stomach jumped with nerves and excitement.

I put a reluctant, meowing Jada safely back in her cat carrying case, talking to her soothingly all the while, and then I just stood there. Tensed and ready.

The train slowed right down and finally stopped. Everyone thronged the corridor, and slowly I pushed my way through the black robed crowds and out onto a tiny, dark, cold platform. I could see the lights of Hogsmeade village in the distance, and that was where everyone was going. I was about to follow them, when I heard a booming voice: "First years! First years, over here!"

I pushed through the chattering crowds to gather with the other first years around a giant of a man with a face full of wild dark hair and beard. He was holding a lantern. I would find out later that this was the Hogwarts groundskeeper, Hagrid.

"Everyone follow me! Any more first years? Mind your step, now! First years, follow me!"

We followed Hagrid off the platform and down a steep, rocky hillside, through forestry, surrounded on either side by thick trees that blocked out all the moonlight. We stumbled around in the dark after Hagrid's lamp. Then we came around a corner and everything suddenly opened up, to reveal a quiet moonlit lake. Across the lake, high up on a hillside, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers, its windows sparkling.

Everyone oohed and aahed, and even I was amazed and impressed. It was… beautiful.

We climbed into little boats, four people to a boat. Hagrid the groundskeeper was so large he had a whole boat to himself. He called, "FORWARD!" and the boats glided on their own, rippling across the smooth lake surface. We approached a cliff, ducked our heads and sailed through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face.

We clambered out into a kind of underground harbor with rocks and pebbles. Neville Longbottom, a clumsy, round-faced boy who kept asking around if anyone had seen his pet toad, had his toad found in the bottom of a boat by Hagrid. Hagrid handed the Trevor the Toad back to Neville's happy hands, and then we clambered up some steps after Hagrid and out into open air, onto smooth, damp grass.

We were now right in the shadow of the castle, facing its front. We climbed the steps and crowded around the huge oak front door.

Hagrid turned around. "Everyone here?! You there, still got your toad?!"

Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door. Unless I was much mistaken, it was time for our house sorting…

Everyone was silent. Even I was nervous. This next couple of hours - it would decide everything.


	10. Chapter 10

10.

The door swung open at once. Standing on the other side was Minerva McGonagall, tall and strict best in her emerald green robes. I offered her a small smile and she gave a brief nod to me, not breaking professionalism.

"The first years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door open wide. The entrance hall was huge, the ceiling too high to make out, the walls stone lit with flaming torches like at Gringotts. A magnificent marble staircase facing us led to the upper floors. Off to the side was a table set with four large hourglasses: one sported rubies, one emeralds, one sapphires, and one great pieces of yellow topaz.

Professor McGonagall - it was impossible right now to think of her as anything else - led us across the flagged stone floor. We could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to our right - the rest of the school must already be here - but Professor McGonagall instead led us into a small side chamber off the main entrance hall. We gathered in there, huddling rather closer together than we usually would have, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn you points, while any rule-breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

She paused, gazing at us for a moment, and then left the chamber. I knew what this would entail - I had to try on a talking, mind reading hat - but I was still silent and nervous, and so was everyone else. What if I wasn't good enough for any of the houses? What if I never made any friends? I told myself it was just my abuse history making me think that way.

Then several people behind me screamed. I whirled around - and watched, fascinated, as about twenty ghosts streamed through the back wall. Pearly white, floating, and transparent, they crossed the hall, speaking to one another and hardly glancing at the first years. They seemed to be arguing over whether a spirit named Peeves - who was not really a ghost - should be banned from the school because he was giving all the other Hogwarts spirits a bad name.

Apparently, Hogwarts was possessed by spirits. And that just added to the awesome. I was not only going to live in a complex, enchanted castle, I was going to live in a haunted, complex, enchanted castle! This was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me!

Finally, the ghosts seemed to notice us. They were quite friendly to the first years, and I gathered that they each remained with the Hogwarts house they'd been Sorted into during their own lifetime. At last, Professor McGonagall returned and told the ghosts sharply to move along, as the Sorting Ceremony was about to start. The ghosts floated through the opposing wall obediently and into the Great Hall.

"Now, form a line," said Professor McGonagall, "and follow me."

Nervous, trying to remember the breathing and positive self talk exercises I'd learned from Madam Pomfrey, I got into line. We walked out of the side chamber, back across the Hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall.

Thousands of candles floated, lit, over four long tables where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. The faces flickered pale in the candlelight, ghosts shining misty silver among them, the students' black Hogwarts robes in sharp relief. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. I could see Hagrid and Madam Pomfrey up here, Dumbledore with his long silver beard in the center of the table in a large gold chair, and also sitting at the staff table was a large number of people I didn't recognize.

Professor McGonagall led us to the top of the hall, in a line facing the other students, the teachers behind us. I looked up, mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, and saw a midnight blue ceiling dotted with stars. It wasn't painted. A know it all girl with frizzy hair and crooked teeth, who had been whispering annoyingly her knowledge of magic and everything to do with Hogwarts since we had entered the entrance hall (even though I thought I remembered from the Hogwarts Express that she was a Muggleborn, and therefore might be trying to compensate for some sort of self consciousness), whispered now, "It's bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, A History."

It was hard to believe there was a ceiling there at all, and that the strange and splendid Great Hall didn't simply open on to the heavens. Hogwarts itself was huge - the biggest place I had ever been in, both in terms of magnificence and also quite literally.

I quickly looked down again as Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed, frayed, patched, and dirty wizard's hat. I was skeptical. This was the great Hogwarts Sorting Hat?

Then a rip near the Hat's brim opened wide like a mouth, and the Hat began to sing. Yes, that's right. Sing.

Oh you may not think I'm pretty,

But don't judge on what you see,

I'll eat myself if you can find

A smarter hat than me.

You can keep your bowlers black,

Your top hats sleek and tall,

For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat

And I can cap them all.

There's nothing hidden in your head

The Sorting Hat can't see,

So try me on and I will tell you

Where you ought to be.

You might belong in Gryffindor,

Where dwell the brave at heart,

Their daring, nerve, and chivalry

Set Gryffindors apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal,

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true

And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,

if you've a ready mind,

Where those of wit and learning,

Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin

You'll make your real friends,

Those cunning folks use any means

To achieve their ends.

So put me on! Don't be afraid!

And don't get in a flap!

You're in safe hands (though I have none)

For I'm a Thinking Cap!

The whole hall burst into applause as the Hat finished its song. It bowed to each of the four house tables and then became quite still again.

I had mixed feelings. Did we really have to be Sorted in front of the entire school? What if the Sorting Hat did reject you? Did it blurt out the contents of your mind in front of everyone? My worries were somewhat assuaged as the Sorting began. What essentially happened was this:

The names were called in alphabetical order based on last name, by Professor McGonagall from a long scroll. The person called would come over, sit down on the stool, and place the Sorting Hat on their head. There was a pause - sometimes whole minutes, sometimes a few seconds. Then the Hat would at last call out the name of a house. That house would cheer and clap as a new student went with relief to sit at their table and join their ranks. Round faced, clumsy Neville Longbottom and the know it all girl with the frizzy hair both went to Gryffindor, for example.

Nobody was rejected. Everyone was assigned some house.

I took deep breaths, my fists clenching and unclenching themselves, until at last my name was called. "Potter, Quintus!" As I stepped forward, whispers filled the Great Hall, everyone craning their heads to get a good look at me. I sat down on the stool, placed the Sorting Hat on my head - it fell right down over my eyes - and I waited.

I was strangely calm, now that it was all happening. There was nothing to do but wait.

"Hmm," said a small voice in my ear, "difficult, very difficult. You have the sort of carelessness of the rules and of your good reputation that would befit a Slytherin, along with their instinctive attraction to darkness and their unusual calm. You are ambitious, also like a Slytherin, and not incredibly arrogant.

"Yet you have the cleverness, desire of information, and instinctive moral compass more befitting of a Ravenclaw. You are attracted to the unknown, like a Ravenclaw, and you believe in camouflage and trickery over overt cheating, also like a Ravenclaw. You hide yourself often, remain neutral, but are not afraid of confrontation.

"You have changed a lot in recent months, Quintus Potter. Harry Potter and Quintus Potter are two entirely different people with two entirely different Sorting layouts. No, I cannot. I refuse to choose. I DECLARE A HATSTALL!"

The Hat was jerked off my head as the last words were shouted to the whole Hall. "Does that mean I have to go home?" I asked Minerva, gazing up at her worriedly.

She smiled. "No, Quintus, it means you are caught between two houses. I was a Hatstall myself. Come see myself and Professor Dumbledore."

I stood, all too aware of the whispers and all the eyes on me, and I walked up nervously to Professor Dumbledore at the High Table. He, myself, and Professor McGonagall all bent forward to have a whispered discussion.

"So. First you get a wand with the same core as Lord Voldemort's but a wood that indicates not only great power but also enormous tolerance and open mindedness, and then you are made a Hatstall, Quintus?" Dumbledore's blue eyes sparkled in amusement behind his spectacles.

"How did you know -?" I wondered.

"Ollivander is a great friend of mine."

I paused, torn. "I'm sorry, sir," I said at last. "About the thing with Rita Skeeter. I didn't mean to make everyone hate you; I don't resent you or anything."

"It's quite alright, Quintus. Glad to hear it. It's not the first time my decisions have been questioned, and it won't be the last," said Dumbledore kindly. "As I understand it, you have led a difficult life. And I think most people would do anything in the face of someone as fearsome as Rita Skeeter," he added wryly. "No offense has been taken."

I relaxed. "Thank you, sir. Now, what to do about a Hatstall?"

"Well, with Hatstalls we have just started in recent years a house exchange program, to foster greater inter-house unity. You would alternate between the two houses from week to week. You would have beds in both dormitories, and your trunk and things would be moved magically for you at the end of each week. You would alternate between houses during great feasts. Your two heads of houses would have to confer with each other about appropriate punishments. When you win or lose points, they will be added equally to or subtracted equally from both houses.

"You would see both common rooms and dormitories, and feast with both houses, on your first night. For your first week, you would spend half of it with one house, and half of it with the other. Your tie and the emblem on your robes would be half and half.

"Or, alternately, you could just choose one house over the other.

"What will it be, Quintus?"

"I like the idea of the exchange program, Professor," I said seriously. "I want to make lots of friends in both houses."

Here, Dumbledore beamed at me. "I hoped you would say that! Now -" He turned to the Sorting Hat. "Which two houses have we decided on?"

"The boy's going to shake things up, Albus. The two houses are Ravenclaw and Slytherin," said the Hat seriously.

Dumbledore's eyebrows lifted. But he stood gamely, and announced to the Hall, "Quintus Potter has chosen to participate in the Inter-House exchange program! His two houses will be Ravenclaw and Slytherin! He will feast with Ravenclaw for the first half of the meal, and Slytherin for the second half! He will spend Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday with Ravenclaw, and Thursday and Friday with Slytherin!"

I was pretty sure I was the only one listening by that point. The Great Hall seemed to have temporarily gone insane. Ravenclaw and Slytherin were cheering, other students were shouting in disbelief, and the teachers were staring at me in utter surprise.

"Quintus," said Dumbledore brightly to me, "meet your two heads of house: Filius Flitwick and Severus Snape!" The little old man beamed and waved brightly. A hook-nosed man with greasy black hair and sallow skin - young to middle aged - was staring at me in surprise and discernment. I hoped I looked good. Everything from my haircut to my robes to my lack of glasses had been tailor-made so that I didn't look like I had before.

"Which one is which?" I muttered to Dumbledore.

"The black haired man is Professor Snape, and he heads Slytherin. The older and smaller man is Professor Flitwick, and he heads Ravenclaw," said Dumbledore. "And now it is time for you to go sit with Ravenclaw house. Over there." He pointed at one of the cheering tables.

I stepped away from the High Table. Minerva placed a hand on my shoulder, looking torn. "Take courage, Quintus," she murmured, "and stick to what you believe in."

I was left uncertain as I walked over to Ravenclaw house table. They were still cheering madly - I was getting the loudest cheer yet - and a buff and muscular Prefect got up to shake my hand. "Robert Hilliard, at you service," he said. "Your head Prefect and a Chaser on the Ravenclaw house Quidditch team. We are by far the cleverest house, so of course you'd come to us," he added arrogantly. "That is our house ghost, The Grey Lady."

He pointed at the ghost of a reserved, pretty woman with long hair and a long, grand dress.

"That over there is the Slytherin house ghost, The Bloody Baron, and your main Slytherin Prefect, Gemma Farley." The ghost was a gaunt man covered in silver blood stains and chains. The Prefect was an older girl with black hair and many tattoos and piercings. She smirked at me and gave me a jaunty, sarcastic little wave. I waved uncertainly back.

I sat down at the table and looked down at my chest. My tie was a weird blend of green and silver on one side, blue and bronze on the other. My emblem was half of an eagle, half of a coiled serpent.

I watched the rest of the Sorting take place. It took several minutes for the Hall to calm down and for the Sorting to continue. At long last, when the last student had been Sorted, Professor McGonagall rolled up the scroll and took the Sorting Hat away.

Dumbledore stood to his feet. He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide, as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see us all there.

"Welcome!" he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! I would like to say a few words, and here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

He sat back down. Everybody clapped and cheered. I was dryly amused. He may be controversial and a bit mad, but I decided I couldn't help liking Albus Dumbledore at least a little. He was just too delightfully weird, which I had the suspicious feeling he would take as the highest compliment.

Then the food appeared suddenly on the plates and all previous thoughts were forgotten. The feast was magnificent, lots of filling meat and potato dishes cooked in a wonderful array of ways, and I dug in immediately.

I started chatting with the students closest to me.

"Terry Boot, at your service," said a thin brown-haired boy, saluting.

"Anthony Goldstein," said a Jewish Italian boy with an open, friendly smile.

"And I'm Padma Patil," said an Indian girl, serious and reserved.

"You're one of the twins who was Sorted," I noted curiously. "Your sister went to Gryffindor."

"Yes. It's disappointing, but -" Padma shrugged. "You can't have everything in life."

"Many of my family members live in America. Some of them wanted me to go to Ilvermorny - the American school," Terry added when I stared blankly. "It's pretty controversial that I'm even here at Hogwarts."

"I'm a Halfblood," said Anthony, "and not exactly of the traditional white nature-based belief system on top of that. I was wondering if I'd even get in here."

"I'm not white either." Padma shrugged stoically. "You don't see me getting self conscious."

"You all know way too much about me already," I joked. "You're probably sick of it by now."

"Do you remember anything - you know, of the night of?" Terry added curiously, as if he could not help himself.

I was uncomfortable. "Little bits and fragments. Nothing concrete. I don't know how I survived, if that's what you're asking."

"What a thing to ask him on his first night!" Padma scolded, and Anthony laughed and I smiled in amusement as Padma threw a potato at Terry.

He ducked out of the way. "Hey!" he said indignantly.

We then turned to Robert Hilliard, who was giving Ravenclaws the ins and outs of surviving their first week of classes with top marks. I listened avidly.

At last, the remains of the food faded from the plates and the desserts appeared. Ice cream, pie, tart, jello, pudding, doughnuts, the treats never ended. "That's my cue, I think," I said, and I stood and walked from Ravenclaw to Slytherin, all too aware of many eyes on me. To my relief, other, older students were doing the same. There weren't many of us, but at least I wasn't the first one.

The Slytherin first years made room for me and I sat down among them. "Finally!" said a pale boy with white blond hair impatiently.

Gemma Farley leaned over and shook my hand. "Gemma Farley," she said. "And congratulations for getting a chance to walk on the wild side a little. Anyone picks on you about your family, you let me know." She winked, not even seeming to notice the way a few first years - not all, but a few - sneered faintly.

"Yes, thank you," I said, and when she'd retreated the blond boy sighed loudly. The big boys on either side of the blond chuckled.

"What she means," he clarified, "is that Slytherin is the house for the Pureblooded."

"But that can't be true, can it?" I asked, puzzled. "My maternal grandparents were Muggles, I was raised by Muggles, and I was Sorted in here. Ambition and cunning are not solely Pureblood traits."

The blond boy flushed, his eyes narrowing, and a handsome dark-haired Italian boy chuckled. "Logic," he said, "Draco Malfoy's greatest enemy."

"Don't insult Draco!" shrieked a girl with a face like a pug who had been gazing at Draco admiringly.

"What do you know, anyway, Zabini?" Draco sneered at the dark-haired boy.

"Enough to agree with the Boy Who Lived, apparently," said the dark-haired boy in dry amusement. "Blaise Zabini." He nodded to me. "Congratulations on not just getting caught up in house rumors or the stupid ideology of one house." I decided I liked Blaise Zabini.

"Thank you," I said, watching the goings-on with reserved caution.

"Look." Draco turned to me determinedly. I thought I remembered him now - he'd practically swaggered up to the Sorting Hat. "You should just switch to Slytherin. It's clearly the best house in the school. And I wouldn't talk too much about your Muggle relatives, if I were you." He shrugged. "Just a piece of friendly advice."

I was watching him sharply. "Thanks for the advice," I said after a moment. "But I choose not to ignore my mother or her background, if it's all the same."

Draco sneered, going a bit pink.

"Oh, Draco, do stop being dreadful," a blonde girl with green eyes sighed, coming to my defense. "Daphne Greengrass," she told me. "And not all Slytherins or even all Purebloods are like Draco Malfoy. Your family is fine."

"Yeah, but he hates it, doesn't he?" Draco sat back, smirking. "He's said so."

A reserved boy with brown curls and glasses spoke up clinically. "So because I hate my father, you think I should pretend he doesn't exist? Theo Nott," he told me flatly. "My father supported the man who killed your family."

My eyebrows rose. Draco Malfoy told Theo to do something very rude while the two thugs on either side of him cracked their knuckles and scowled. The pug-faced girl was glaring, as was the posse of girls I could see gathered around her, and Daphne Greengrass and Blaize Zabini rolled their eyes. Theo Nott looked unimpressed.

At last, Gemma Farley came over. "Hey! No fighting between house mates," she snapped. "We're Slytherins and we treat each other like family! We support each other, even when no one else in the school likes us! You got that? If I ever see any of you fighting with each other, I will put a stop to it." She glared and left. Draco Malfoy looked mutinous.

But just then, the desserts faded away and Dumbledore got to his feet again. The whole hall fell silent. "Muggle-lover," Draco Malfoy muttered, glaring at Dumbledore.

Dumbledore gave several announcements: The forest and the lake on the grounds were forbidden to all pupils, because of dangerous magical creatures within. Mr Filch, the janitor and caretaker, wanted to remind everyone that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quidditch trials would be held in the second week of term; anyone second year and above interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch.

"And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

I stared, and I wasn't the only one. A dead silence fell on the Great Hall. Albus Dumbledore smiled whimsically.

"And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!" cried Dumbledore. I noticed that the other teachers' smiles had become rather fixed.

Dumbledore flicked his wand and a long golden ribbon flew out of it. The ribbon rose above the tables and twisted itself, snake-like, into words.

"You've got to be kidding me," Draco Malfoy was heard to say.

"Everyone pick their favorite tune," said Dumbledore, "and off we go!" And the school bellowed:

Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,

Teach us something please,

Whether we be old and bald,

Or young with scabby knees,

Our heads could do with filling,

With some interesting stuff,

For now they're bare and full of air,

Dead flies and bits of fluff,

So teach us things worth knowing,

Bring back what we've forgot,

Just do your best, we'll do the rest,

And learn until our brains all rot.

It was a bizarre song, and everyone finished singing it at different times. At last, only a mischievous pair of red-headed teenage boys at the Gryffindor table were left, singing along to a very slow funeral march. Dumbledore conducted their last few lines with his wand and when they had finished, he was one of those who clapped loudest.

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here. And now, bedtime. Off you trot!"

Gemma Farley found me in the crowds rushing out the double doors. "I'll show you Slytherin," she said, "then take you up to the entrance hall and hand you off to Hilliard until Thursday."

I went with the first year Slytherins out of the Great Hall, into the entrance hall, and down a staircase instead of up one. We traveled down into cold stone, past countless dungeons complete with chains and manacles, until we finally arrived at a blank patch of stone wall.

"The password changes every week," said Gemma. "Never let anyone except a fellow Slytherin behind this wall. The password this week is: Amortentia."

The stone wall slid aside and we entered a long, low underground room, rather like a dungeon, with rough stone walls and ceiling. Round, greenish lamps hung from chains. A fire was crackling under an elaborately carved mantelpiece decorated with green-eyed serpents ahead of us, and green carved chairs were set around it. The latticed high windows around the common room showed a view of what had to be the Black Lake, which made quiet lapping water noises against the walls and gave everything a dark, greenish tinge. Even as I watched, silhouettes appeared at the windows: a mermaid, a giant squid.

"We like to pretend we live in a mysterious underwater shipwreck," said Gemma proudly.

There was lots of low-backed black leather sofas and dark green button-tufted leather sofas. There were skulls, and dark wood cupboards. Tapestries featuring the adventures of famous medieval Slytherins decorated the walls. An elaborate chess set sat in a corner next to two burning, flickering candles dripping wax.

"The new password will be there on the bulletin board every week," said Gemma, pointing. "Now let me show you to your dormitories." She led us down a corridor off the main common room.

The first year Slytherin boys' dormitory room was another dark stone room; it had several four-poster beds with green silk hangings. Silver lanterns hung from the ceiling, and Slytherin crests and famous medieval Slytherin acts tapestries once more decorated the walls.

"Quintus," said Gemma from outside in the corridor, "come with me." The other Slytherin boys watched curiously as I walked outside and was led back out of the Slytherin common room, back out of the dungeons, and up the main staircase the entrance hall.

"See you on Thursday," said Gemma, nodding, handing me off to Robert Hilliard, who was waiting. He, instead, led me up the main marble staircase to the upper floors. We walked down corridors and up staircases, past paneled walls, past moving and whispering paintings, past tapestries and statues, past suits of armor. Once an invisible spirit swished over our heads, cackling and dropping marbles all over us that clattered to the floor.

"Peeves," said Robert Hilliard, his lips tight with displeasure, once the spirit had passed. "The resident mischievous Poltergeist. The Gryffindors must have irritated him again."

We walked and walked, twice going behind tapestries or sliding panels to a hidden door within, skipping over trick stairs, making our complex, winding way up several flights of stairs until we finally reached a twisting spiral staircase set into a wall.

We made our tight, winding way up the staircase, until we reached a door with a bronze knocker in the shape of an eagle. Robert knocked with the knocker, and the eagle opened its mouth and issued a silvery female voice.

"Who is the hero, the dragon or he who slays it?"

Robert turned to me. "What do you think, Quintus?"

I thought for a moment. "It depends on which perspective you're looking at," I said at last.

"Well reasoned," said the eagle, and the door swung open magically on its own to let us through.

"The knocker gives you a riddle to solve every time you want to walk into Ravenclaw Tower," said Robert. "And you have to wait in front of the door until someone gets it right. You'll get used to it," he added when I looked worried. "All first years do. It's actually a nice way to meet fellow house members. You're a Ravenclaw; you'll figure it out. But always triple check you have everything you need before you leave Ravenclaw Tower."

We walked into the common room, which was a wide, circular, airy room with arched windows covered in blue and bronze silks. The bluish-purplish silks fluttered; wind whistled softly around the windows, which must in the daytime give a spectacular view of the surrounding mountains. That we were in a tower; that much was obvious. I could have guessed without Robert telling me.

A little wood fire stove flickered with firelight, several foot stools and blue chairs set around it. There was a midnight blue carpet covered with stars, which was reflected in the domed ceiling. There were chairs set around study tables, and countless bookcases filled with books. I spied a book rental signup sheet on the common room bulletin board. A tall white marble statue of a beautiful woman stood beside a staircase further up into one of the turrets.

"That's our house founder, Rowena Ravenclaw," said Robert, noticing where I was looking.

"Who was the Slytherin founder?" I wondered.

"Salazar Slytherin, a man," said Robert simply. "Now follow me." We walked up the turret staircase and down a corridor to the first year Ravenclaw boys' dormitory room. The four-poster beds this time were covered in blue silk eiderdowns.

Robert left me there and said goodnight, all the other Ravenclaw boys looking at me curiously, just as the Slytherin boys had.

Too tired to talk much, we pulled on our pajamas and climbed into bed - all of our things had already been brought up. With my beech and phoenix feather wand at my bedside, and Jada my Siamese cat curled beside me on my bed, I fell asleep to the peaceful sound of whistling wind.

Tomorrow would be my first official day at Hogwarts.


	11. Chapter 11

11.

The moment I left my dormitory next day, the whispers began. People lining up outside classrooms stood on tiptoe to get a good look at me, or doubled back to pass me again in the corridors, staring. The bolder ones still asked for pictures and autographs. I wished they wouldn't bother me so much, because I was trying to concentrate on finding my way to my classes. I gave everybody politeness enough, and I kept my calm, but in reality it was rather irritating.

Hogwarts was an incredibly complex place to navigate even for a student. Between all the staircases and the corridors, the trick stairs, the staircases that led somewhere different depending on what day of the week it was, the doors that wouldn't open unless you did the right set of actions, the doors that weren't really doors at all but instead were solid walls just pretending… It was a nightmare. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other. The coats of armor could talk. Nothing stayed in one place for very long. And the hundreds of messenger owls suddenly streaming through the Great Hall in the mornings at breakfast was always a bit of a shock (though I had to admit, the free wifi was excellent and I quickly exchanged virtual information with all my new friends, older and younger alike).

A few things saved me. First, The Grey Lady - who never spoke to anybody outside Ravenclaw Tower - silently glided along, leading the Ravenclaw first years to their lessons. She became my good friend after I told her she was very pretty, and very nice for helping us all out like that - she favored me with a rare, silent smile. And second, the Slytherin first years all moved together as one unit, with the older Slytherins making it their prime mission in life to help the first years get to their classes on time. Once you were a Slytherin, you were a member of a very small and intimate family. Slytherins never had to worry about Peeves the Poltergeist, a floating little man with wicked dark eyes, playing tricks on them either. Peeves tried to sneak up behind me once and The Bloody Baron appeared suddenly, rising up before him, howling so fiercely that Peeves screeched and whizzed away.

"Thank you, sir," I said quietly, the other Slytherin first years behind me too afraid to speak.

The Blood Baron became quiet again; he looked down at me and nodded. "Just do well in classes," was all he said in a hoarse whisper.

Both houses on the whole were actually very supportive. I did indeed meet many Ravenclaws as we all gathered around the common room door, trying to figure out the latest riddle together. It became fun, a kind of collective puzzle.

So while Filch the caretaker, a bitter old man with bulging, lamp-like eyes and a nasty skinny little cat, and Peeves the Poltergeist were floating around, I didn't really have any serious run-ins with either of them. And the giant groundskeeper Hagrid turned out to be friendly enough unless you went close to the Forbidden Forest or tried to swim in the Black Lake. Which I didn't. I'd seen the size of some of the things floating around in the Black Lake, and if the Forbidden Forest could boast equally frightening creatures, I had no desire to go near it.

I did have classes with both houses that first week. I made friends in each house. Daphne, Blaise, and Theo became my closest friends in Slytherin, while Terry, Anthony, and Padma became my closest friends in Ravenclaw. I also did genuinely talk with both house ghosts, wanting to know more about what it was like being a member of the living dead, and they seemed both surprised and flattered by my interest and by the fact that I wasn't intimidated by them. They, like Robert Hilliard, gave me tips on how to thrive in classes my first week.

I had seven classes to start out with in my first year. There was Astronomy - we studied the night skies through our telescopes every Wednesday at midnight from the top of the tallest tower, our telescopes magically magnified so we could see incredible astronomical phenomena. Professor Sinistra, the Astronomy teacher, was a quiet dark-skinned woman, quite young for a professor. Three times a week we went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, learning the names and uses of magical plants. Professor Sprout, the Herbology teacher, was a plump, cheerful little witch with wild grey hair and dirt underneath her fingernails.

History of Magic was appropriately enough taught by a droning old ghost named Professor Binns. He had fallen asleep in front of the staff room fire one evening and got up next morning to teach, leaving his body behind him. Some students whispered that he had no idea he was dead - "Maybe he just thinks he's lived a very long time!" - but no one had the heart to tell him. He somehow managed to make even the most fascinating history lessons seem deadly dull, and his was a heavily edited version of magical history with the obvious influence of the Ministry behind it.

Professor Flitwick was the Charms teacher - he taught the art of changing the properties of objects and beings using wand magic. He was very excited to have me in his house and his class, and made a huge effort from the beginning to reach out and be there for me. He took out a tin of cupcakes from his desk and beamed, making them dance for me, on the morning before my first class, and he had a habit of squeaking excitedly. He was literally the most cuddly person you could possibly think of.

Professor McGonagall of course taught Transfiguration, the art of using wand magic to transform some things into other things, and she was stern and strict. She changed her desk into a pig and back again in our first class to impress upon us the sheer scope of what Transfiguration magic could do. Her class was intellectual, clever, and complex.

Defense Against the Dark Arts was taught by a thin, turbaned, nervous, pale, stuttering man called Professor Quirrell, who stammered through even pre written speeches, seemed afraid of his own shadow, and smelled strongly of garlic. Needless to say, we were somewhat skeptical he would be able to teach us the ins and outs of hexes, jinxes, curses, and dark creatures. Student rumor had it Professor Quirrell didn't always used to be that way - he went out traveling and discovering himself for a year and met a vampire in the Black Forest and a nasty group of hags. He came back terrified of pretty much everything. No one knew anything about the turban, which made his small head look extremely absurd, and Gryffindors, the only ones either tactless or brave enough to ask, reported that he changed the story of how he had gotten it each time he was asked.

I was determined to do well starting out, working very hard at it, and to my pleasure I was at the top of my class. Slytherins expected greatness and supported each other toward that end goal, and Ravenclaws raced each other for the best grades but also gave each other lots of scholarly advice. And of course I had great drive and had gotten loads of help over the summer. Poppy had been right - magic, once sensed out, was a physical exercise, one that came naturally to me if I practiced at it tirelessly enough times. And my reading helped my academic grades a lot.

Flying lessons with Madam Hooch on the school brooms - which I was very much looking forward to - unfortunately didn't usually start until the second or third week. So soon enough, the only class I hadn't taken was Potions with Professor Snape.

I signed up for school activities, mainly music and art. Flitwick headed both extracurricular activities, and seemed excited by my charcoal coffee house drawing style and by my emphasis in piano, violin, and voice. "We'll get you an expert in both subjects and animating your drawings in no time at all, Quintus!" he squeaked. Flitwick was a very relaxed, freeform teacher, perfect for the arts.

I also explored the castle and grounds with my extended group of friends - both Ravenclaw and Slytherin; they got to know each other - during our free time on my first week, and I had my first Inter-House luncheon that first week. Inter-House luncheons were potlucks thrown together in an empty classroom, so that all of the Hatstall students could mingle and converse with one another. They took me under their wing.

"Your fellow house mates trust you a bit less at first," one younger student confirmed for me. "But if you work hard at becoming one of them, they'll accept you." She nodded as I relaxed in relief.

There were of course dormitory fights right from the beginning. Theo, Draco, and Blaise most decidedly did not get along - Theo and Blaise found Draco grating, while Draco had the humongous Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle on his side. Meanwhile in Ravenclaw, Kevin Entwhistle snored and Michael Corner, a light sleeper, soon took to openly picking fights with him, intimidating Kevin who was a much quieter, nerdier sort of person.

I had my first meeting with Madam Pomfrey for therapy in the school infirmary that week. The infirmary was a long room filled with white hospital beds, nothing remarkable, but Madam Pomfrey's office was where we had therapy. I tried to keep my therapy a secret, because Draco Malfoy seemed to resent me - I'd usurped his place on the throne, so to speak - and he had enough ammunition on me already.

Poppy and I discussed how I was adjusting during my first week, my fears neither house completely trust me, and my fears of not doing well at wizarding school. We tried to work on those subjects together. It was a painful session, but I felt better after it was over.

And at last, on Friday after breakfast, Slytherins had Potions with the Gryffindors.

The Potions classroom took place down in one of the dungeons. Hundreds of glittering vials of liquid lined the walls, stray cauldrons bubbled and sizzled over fires, and there were pickled animals floating in glass jars all along the walls.

Professor Snape paid me no notice until after he had finished taking role. His eyes were cold black tunnels, and he spoke in barely more than a whisper, but we caught every word. He gave a brief speech on the beauty, art, and science of potion-making, telling us he could teach us all we wished to know, all the power we wished to have, finishing with a scathing, "If you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."

Then he suddenly turned to me and started barking questions. I recognized them from my studies in my books, what I had been told to focus on and read. I answered each question correctly, calmly and evenly, and Professor Snape gave me a piercing stare for a long moment.

"Well," he said at last, turning away dismissively, "at least someone's prepared for class. Five points to Slytherin and Ravenclaw."

Draco Malfoy gave me a glare and the Gryffindors were staring at me.

"Did I say something wrong?" I whispered to my Slytherin friends.

"Snape never compliments anyone," Blaise whispered back, grinning.

"Not even his own Slytherins," said Theo, interested and detached.

Professor Snape set us to work at workstations in two-person groups, one person setting up a cauldron for each group. We either took out our own Potions ingredients or took them from the student stores, slipped on our gloves, took out our scales and knives, and started the fire below the cauldron. We had a set amount of time to brew a simple potion to cure boils, and then we had to put some of our potion in one of our vials and hand it in to Snape at the end of class.

It sounded simple, and for me it was. After all the practicing and reading I had done, it was not a hard assignment. Professor Snape swept around in his long black cloak, criticizing almost everybody. He stopped at my station and looked into the potion. As far as I could tell, it was exactly how it was supposed to look.

"How did you know to crush instead of slice the scuttlefish spine?" he said at last.

"I-I read a lot, sir," I said, ducking my head.

"Hm. So you were Sorted correctly," he mused. Before I could do more than ponder what he meant by that, he said, "Five more points, Mr Potter," and moved on.

The Gryffindors all hated me by the end of class, but as far as I was concerned they could all go fuck themselves because I was elated. Ten points for my two houses in my very first week!

But there was one more thing I had to do that Friday afternoon before my first week was over.

I knocked on the office door and opened it. Minerva looked up from her mahogany desk. "Quintus," she said warmly with a small smile, "come in."

I smiled and sat down across from her.

"So how has your first week been? You have been keeping up with your studies, haven't you?" she added sternly.

And, happy, I began to tell her all about my first week at Hogwarts. At the end, I added curiously, "Minerva, Professor Snape acted very oddly toward me today. Complimentary, but odd. Is there something I'm missing?"

Minerva smiled wryly. "Professor Snape was friends with your mother in school. I wouldn't talk to him about it; he took her death very badly. But he most decidedly did not like your father. I think he expected to hate you like he did James.

"I think Professor Snape is simply coming to the realization that in fashion and mannerisms, you are very unlike your swaggering Gryffindor father."


End file.
